You Live, You Learn: 3: One More For The Road
by Seanchaidh
Summary: Well, let's face it: if you've survived the mammoth cast, weird plot and immensity of writing involved in the trilogy so far, you're going to want to know how it ends. Right? This is the last part of the trilogy, I promise! Last two chapters added!
1. Chapter 1

One More For The Road (sequel to Life Goes On)

Chapter 1

_"It's been six months since I last spoke to you all, though much less since I last spoke to my brother. He knows I'm on my way. I haven't told him: I don't need to. He asked me to return; they need me at the hospital. Now that it is clear that Aeryn is very definitely pregnant, she has had to step back and stay at the farm. She should be due any day now, but she has Alice with her and Tai San goes up to help out with the herb garden._

_The school is up and running, but without Salene. She carried the baby to term, but it was stillborn and there were other complications: she's still in the hospital and under constant supervision. Pride won't leave her. He's hurting, but he won't show it. He thinks he needs to be strong for her, but she needs to know that he's hurting too. My brother has tried to talk some sense into him, but he won't listen. He won't eat or sleep either. Even Ryan's tried talking to him, but he doesn't want to speak to him at all: Lex hasn't told me why yet, I'll find out when I get there._

_Bray has gone. He couldn't sit in the mall without his son or Amber, doing nothing: he went to look for them. I hope he's alright: winter's nearly upon us and he wasn't in that good a state when he left, almost crazy according to Lex._

_Ebony is also near the painful end of her pregnancy and Patch and Dee have her confined to her husband's old side room in the hospital and are frantically trying to feed her up: the girl has no fat on her and, if she wants to be able to deliver this baby, she needs a good layer of the stuff. I think that has something to do with Lex wanting me back in the city: I'm the only one of them who has even seen a caesarian section being done and if Ebony doesn't bulk up before delivery, that's what will have to be done._

_Tai San did figure out what was going on, eventually. It took her a while to believe it was true and even now I think she still has problems understanding it. Apparently my brother talks in his sleep and speaks out loud when he's talking to me: he hasn't quite got the hang of not having to talk when he's talking to me, yet, although he may make more of an effort now he's been found out. Tai San has been sworn to secrecy in the meantime._

_As for the rest, well, Angie and Jetta are still working at the hospital, although they are training nurses now, with Dee. Paul went out with May and her search team about a month ago and they still haven't returned. Jack gave them lists of coordinates he got from the data behind Operation Dormouse. If they find anyone alive, they'll bring them home; if not, it's up to them what to do with the bodies. Ellie wasn't the only Mall Rat found in the computer systems once Jack hacked into the system. Well, perhaps not a Mall Rat exactly, but he would have been if he had survived. It appears, after seven months of searching, that Operation Dormouse claimed one last victim._

_I can see the farm now. I'd better hurry: the light is fading. I'll speak to you again soon."_


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Jetta, she needs me!" Jack called as the blue haired girl stormed across their room. Jetta turned on her heel and bore down on him with an unrivaled ferocity.

"I can't believe your still trying to make that line stick!" she yelled, "I need you too, Jack! She's not alive; I am! She's just a computer program now!"

"You know she's more than that!"

"To you!"

"Not just to me, Jetta! She was alive! She was a person, a Mall Rat, just like you and me!"

"The only difference being that you loved her!"

"Loved. Past tense. I love you now, Jetta!"

"You'll never love me as much as you loved her!" Jetta shouted then, turning before Jack could answer, she stalked out of the room.

"But I do!" Jack said as she disappeared through their door.  


--  


"Pride?"

"I don't want you near her, Ryan." Pride replied, his voice monotone and lifeless.

"It's not her I'm worried about," Ryan said, gently, "She's in good hands; Dee and Patch are good at their job. You're the one that hasn't eaten or slept since ..."

"I know. But that's nothing to do with you. You have nothing to do with me. I don't want your pity."

"Maybe not; but if you ever need someone to talk to, just remember that I've been through the same thing."

Ryan left the room before Pride could reply. Hobbling over on the wooden leg he had carved for her, Helena took one hand off her crutches and placed it on Ryan's arm.

"He still won't talk to me," Ryan told her.

"Give him time, Ryan. As far as he's concerned you're the last person he wants to see right now."

"I know, but that's not my fault. She needed someone to talk to and she came to me, just like she always did. It's just a habit with Salene."

"You know that's not it! You were there when she woke up: you heard her."

Moving away from the side-room door, they sat down at the chairs in the centre of the main ward to continue their conversation. Helena almost slipped as she shifted her weight on the crutches to ease herself into the seat, but Ryan was there to catch her. It had been a hard six months, getting used to having only one and a half legs, but Ryan had been there to help her through, just as he had been in the mines.

"I know, but that's not my fault either. I'm no threat to him: I'm not her lover, just her sounding board, her agony aunt. That's all I ever was to Sal."

"But it's not all she ever was to you, Pride knows that; and remember he didn't know either of you when you were together. What would you think if your wife, after almost dying, woke up and said her ex's name?"

"I guess I'd feel pretty bad."  


--  


May led her troop of searchers through a deep gully, following an old map on which Jack had marked a number of crosses: these were the remaining Techno outposts and testing stations, where the remaining Mall Rats were hoped to be found. Paul walked swiftly behind May, his head held high. The team had travelled a long way from the city, but there would still be another day or two's walk before they could hope of finding the first outpost.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

_"When I arrived at the farm, I arrived in the midst of a heated, yet muted, discussion. Denver lay sleeping in his cot, over a year old now; he looked so much like his father, apparently, in his face, but he had his mother's red curls. Andy was sitting guard over his nephew when I arrived: the only resident males at the moment confined to the corner and out of the meeting. The meeting itself consisted of Alice, Tally, Aeryn, a girl I didn't know and Tai San, who had been helping out with the herb garden earlier that day."_

"What about Andy and Denver?" Tally was asking as I entered the room.

"Well, they don't count," Alice answered, "They're family."

"Then what about Zed?" Aeryn asked, "And my baby, if it's a boy: will they be welcome?"

"Of course they will!" Alice said, jovially, "It's just, they won't be running it, will they? It'll just be you and me."

"Alice has a point," Tai San cut in, "This is a farm being run by two, very strong, young women. It deserves such a name."

"What name?" I asked.

"Cat!" Aeryn cried, getting up to waddle over to me, "What are you doing back? I thought that you had left us for good!"

"I heard that someone was expecting a miracle and thought I'd come back to see for myself!"

_"Aeryn laughed, as did everyone else, except Tai San; she was the only one who was not surprised by my return: I guess Lex must have told her I was on my way. I still don't know what to make of Tai San. Sometimes, I think she sees me the same way she did when we first met; other times, I think she resents the fact there is someone who can get closer to Lex than she can: someone who knows him better, shares some of his history, that sort of thing. Perhaps this time round, Lex and I should let her in on all our secrets, tell her exactly what is going on. Lex agrees: he just told me so."_

--

Cloe sat in the basement of the old hotel. It had only been two weeks ago that Josh had finally asked her out: over a year since her husband died! Now that she had just managed to get used to the idea that he was gone, and had started to let another man into her life, Jack turns up and tells her that he's found Ved, trapped in the computer system. He wasn't on a disc, like all the rest of the disappeared ones they had found through the sinister Operation Dormouse, he was on the hard drive: the one that was linked through all of the computers in the hotel! His brother had always said that if he spent much more time near those computers, one of these days he'd turn into one: now he was! He was right there in front of her: he had been there all the time and she hadn't known. The question was: did she want him to know that she knew?

Cloe hovered the mouse cursor over the file that they now knew contained her husband. She clicked the right button and a list of options came up. Her life was just getting back to normal now, or as normal as it could be. Only Jack knew he was here, she thought: would he blame her if Ved's file disappeared forever? The cursor moved back and forth between "delete" and "run", her indecision continuing for what seemed like an eternity, then she pressed her finger down on the left mouse button and made her choice.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The first of the outposts on their list was in sight, but the short days had slowed the search party immensely: it was difficult enough, travelling in unknown countryside such as this, but in the dark, it could be treacherous. With the last of the light, as his fellows set up the camp below the crest of the hill, Paul looked out over the valley below them; he hoped and prayed that the sprawling complex he looked down on housed his sister. Lost in thoughts and memories of happier times, Paul didn't notice the approach of one of his companions at his side.

Zed put his hand on the boy's shoulder and was surprised when Paul jumped. The one thing that had struck him about Paul was his ability to know where people were even without being able to hear them. He wished he knew what was bothering the boy, but Paul would only talk to May by writing her notes on where he thought they should go next. Any questions Zed asked him, he answered with a simple shake of his head.

When Paul spun round, his long hair whipping round behind him as he did so, the first thing he saw was the red bandana tied around Zed's arm: the same one he had used to bind Helena's wounded leg so long ago. His eyes moved to Zed's face and watched as the young man told him what was happening in the camp, that their meal was ready, and then asked him if he was alright. Paul nodded hurriedly then brushed past Zed into the camp, where May was waiting. He wrote her a short note, read her reply and then sat down to his meal, suddenly feeling the hunger he had been ignoring for the past few hours.

--

"I want to rename the farm "Amazon Farm"," said Alice as she poured a mug of tea for Cat "in recognition of all the troubles we girls have pulled through this last year."

"But I don't think it's fair to the boys," added Aeryn, easing herself back into her chair.

"What do the boys think?" Cat asked.

"They haven't asked them!" Tally cried, indignantly, on her brother's behalf.

"Well, it is only Aeryn and I who will be running the place!" Alice answered.

"With their help!" Tally replied, "And mine!"

"She is right, Alice," said Tai San, always keeping one eye on Cat.

Alice slumped into her chair and looked as though she was beaten.

"I know," she said. Then, her eyes flicking straight to Andy, "Well, what do you think, Andy: you're the only resident male here over the age of two?"

Andy's eyes went round every young woman in the room once, then flicked back to his sister, who was standing with her arms folded, staring directly at him with a look that threatened death in seconds should he give the wrong answer.

"Um, I think we should wait for Zed to get back. He lives here too: he shouldn't miss this."

"A valid point!" Cat exclaimed, returning her gaze to Alice in the manner of someone watching a particularly amusing game of tennis.

"Okay, we'll wait then," Alice conceded under the massed stare of companions, "But don't think that you'll make me forget about this: I won't"

--

_"I know you're not used to hearing from me, but there is something you need to know and, as my sister is busy, I guess I'd better explain._

_There are, as you may already know, a number of babies on the way, most importantly Aeryn's and Ebony's. Aeryn, according to her medical history, shouldn't be able to have children and is, by being pregnant herself, taking one of our midwives out of commission for the time being. Ebony hasn't been eating enough; she was skinny enough to begin with: if she doesn't get some more layers of fat on her bones, she won't be able to deliver the baby normally. In other words, she'll need a caesarian section and if Cat isn't back here in time, I'm the only one with a hope in hell of performing that op successfully._

_One thing we don't want to do is let everyone know that they have a magician as City Leader and an amateur one at that! Tai San already knows most of what's been going on, but if she's going to understand any of it then she needs to know the whole story. It ain't easy, hiding something this big from the one person who knows you inside out and back to front. If ever I had a soulmate, she's it; she has to be a full part of this._

_Magic and leadership don't go well together. They make people who don't understand either of them jumpy and scared. We've only just got this city under wraps: if the general public were to find out the real source of my knowledge, there could be riots that would put all of us in danger. If we can keep this secret until the next election at least, we should be safe. I can always disappear afterwards if needs be._

_I think we're safe for now though. The only person who knows anything about my sister and I is Tai San and she won't let it slip."_


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Jack scuffed his heels as he wandered along the corridor of the hotel that led to the basement room housing the Operation Dormouse computers. It was late, but he hadn't been able to sleep. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and sighed. How could he ever hope to explain to Jetta what was going on in that room. Ellie was still trying to come to terms with the fact that she was trapped in the computer system forever, but Ved was a help there. Jack and Ved had become firm friends in the time since one had found the other, flitting through the computer system. Ved knew Ram's systems like the back of his hand, even more so now that he had spent over a year trapped in them; he was also free to roam throughout the network and could enter Ellie's program and spend time with her: something Jack was immensely grateful for. The aim of the two boys was to link the hotel computers with those in the hospital so that Ram's many resources of knowledge could be available to the hospital staff. It was part of the same aim to get Ellie onto the linked hard drive of the systems and able to roam with Ved.

As he wandered down the stairs to the basement, Jack saw the light coming from beneath the door and was instantly on guard: no-one should be in there at this time of night. As he reached the door, he heard footsteps coming towards him and flattened himself against the wall on the opposite side of the door, where he would be hidden when the door opened. A few seconds later, the door did just that and a shorter figure emerged into the shadow and closed the door behind them. The instant the door closed, Jack leapt forward and pinned the intruder against the wall.  


--  


As the noises in the hospital died down to the sound of gentle breathing and the occasional snore, Salene awoke. Extracting her hand from Pride's, she looked down the bed at her second husband's sleeping head and wondered if she could get up without waking him. Noiselessly she eased herself out of the opposite side of the bed. The pain and stiffness in her joints seared through her like hot pokers. Pulling a robe around her, she walked, barefooted, across the cold, smooth floor and out into the main ward.

There was a light on in the office. Salene didn't know who was on duty that night, but she knew she didn't want to see them. Softly returning to the side ward, she retrieved her clothes, checked that Pride was still asleep and then left the room. Finding her way to an unused corridor where no-one would hear her or happen to be passing, Salene dressed herself, ran her fingers through her hair, checked again that there was no-one about and left the hospital.  


--  


Jetta sat on the roof of the mall with her coat pulled tightly round her and her knees brought up to her chest. She wasn't sleeping; she wasn't stargazing: she was staring straight ahead of her at a point in the perimeter wall of the roof; a point in the railing where, nine months ago, she had stood with Jack.  


--  


Zed had been sleeping soundly, more soundly that he had for a long time, when he was woken by the touch of a hand on his cheek. Looking up he saw May, silhouetted in the starlight, kneeling beside him.

"What is it, May?" he asked.

"Nothing," she smiled, "I was just watching you sleep."

"You should be asleep yourself."

"I can't sleep. It's too cold. Of course, if we were to share our blankets … you know, share body heat and all that … that might help me sleep."

"It's not that cold, May. Just move closer to the fire."

"Xaviour, you know how much I care about you!"

"Yes and I care about you too, but not in that way: you're my friend, I don't want to hurt you."

"Whatever," May said, standing up and storming off.

Sighing and rolling over in his blankets, Zed tried to get back to sleep.  


--  


In an old warehouse, in a derelict and disused part of the city, a fire glowed, betraying the shape of a young woman standing at the window. With only the night to see her, however, she leant out of the window and let the cool night air lift her hair in shadowy streamers flying out behind her.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"Cloe!" Jack cried when he recognised the intruder, "W-what are you doing here?"

"I, um, I," Cloe's voice shook as she tried to think what to say.

"Of course," he said, leaning his hands on the wall Cloe stood against, on either side of her, as he spoke, "You were here to see Ved."

"Jack, I …"

"How did he seem? He's been talking about you. He really misses you Clo."

As soon as Jack used Ved's pet name for her, the tears broke through.

"Oh, Jack," she sobbed.

Confused, the boy put his arms round her and drew her close to him, waiting patiently as she cried into his chest.

"I-I know it's hard," he said, trying to comfort her, "but you'll get used to it. It was hard for me too, seeing Ellie for the first time when I thought she was dead. I had just come to terms with it, just begun to move on. B-but it gets better in time."

Everything he said was true: Cloe knew how Jack had been when they first found Ellie. She also knew that, as much as he wanted to make her feel better, everything he said only made her feel worse, because he had been able to do something she could not. He had been able to look Ellie in the face and tell her the truth. He hadn't been selfish and thought only how Ellie's presence would disrupt his life, like she had with Ved. He hadn't even considered deleting her files and "killing" her entirely. Like she had with Ved.

"Jack, please," Cloe sobbed, looking up at him.

"W-what's wrong?"

"I didn't see him. I couldn't," Cloe's tears were subsiding now, but she knew it would only be a brief reprieve, "I didn't want to, I thought. I can't now, anyway: he's gone."

"G-gone? Gone where? Cloe, what do you mean?" Jack held her at arms length for a moment, watching her face, before releasing her and bolting through the door to the computers. One monitor was still on. Searching the screen, he could see that Ved's files, previously stored on the desktop where they could be easily found, were no longer there.

"I'm sorry, Jack."

"Cloe. WHAT did you do?"  


--  


Salene walked for hours. She didn't recognise the area around her. She wasn't heading for the Mall or anywhere else that she knew, but that wasn't a problem. All she wanted to do just now was get away: away from the city; away from the people who knew her; away from the places where both of her babies had died; away from everything and everyone who would remind her of them. All she could do was keep walking and hope they never found her, but, gradually, she began to slow down, to stumble over even her own feet. Her body was still weak from its ordeal: she needed rest. Crumpling up into a ball in the doorway of a tall, old building, she hid her head in her arms and slept.  


--  


Lex couldn't sleep. He sat in the café, nursing a mug of coffee: it wouldn't help him sleep, but at least it was hot. He was considering getting dressed and heading for the old library when he heard Trudy's voice in the corridor outside.

"Shh, Brady," she crooned, gently, "Come on, come get a glass of water with Mommy."

A few seconds later, Trudy, leading her daughter by the hand, entered the café.

"Hey, Trude," said Lex, getting up to leave, "Trouble sleeping?"

"She's too warm," Trudy answered, referring to her daughter, "I thought a walk and a drink would help cool her down."

"Let me take a look," Lex offered, drawing on the knowledge he had gained from his sister nine months ago.

"No!" cried the child, immediately hiding behind her mother's legs.

"Hey, Brady," Trudy chided, gently, "it's only Uncle Lex!"

"No!" remained the child's stern reply.

"I'm sorry Lex, she's been like this for months. Her first victim was Cat, not long after you and Tai San brought her here. I just don't know what it's all about. She used to like you, now she hides every time she sees you, ever since you became City Leader."

"Don't worry about it Trude. Kids can be like that sometimes. It'll pass."

Smiling awkwardly, Trudy0 nodded as Lex passed her and left the café. Lex returned to his room and, as he had been planning to, dressed and left the mall. Looking round to make sure no-one was in sight or following him, he headed for the old library at the university. Perhaps if he had looked up, Lex would have seen Jetta looking down from the roof, watching him go.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Cat spent the first few days of her return at the farm, being kept abreast of any developments in the city by her and her brother's unique mental bond. There had been changes in the farm while she had been away, most of which she had seen when scrying out her friends, but there were some which took her entirely by surprise.

Building work had begun on a new house on the far side of the orchard. For all that there were no stonemasons or bricklayers in this new world, there was one carpenter and a lot of resources. The peace that had descended upon the city this past year had given the inhabitants space for a lot of changes. People were using the new library in the school, formed from collected books from the old university library, which Lex still kept private and locked, and the electronic resources left by the Technos and made available once more by Jay and Jack. There were no exam results that dictated which courses you could take, only books to read and learn from at your own pace and for once the young adults of the new city turned their hopes to careers. Patch had been the first to make use of these books, after having received his wedding present, and the hospital now had its own library of medical volumes and journals as well as books on alternative therapies.

The city's first carpenter, and the man in charge of the first proper house to be built since the virus, was Ryan. He had studied books on building and set himself the challenge of building himself a house. Now, with Alice and0 Aeryn's permission, he had started work. Cat had come across the house the on her first morning at the farm, while Ryan had been hard at work laying floorboards with help from Slade and a few others that Cat did not recognise. The young man had a talent: She could see from the layout of the house and the surrounding area that the finished building would be a great achievement, as well as a beautiful one.

Paul had helped to begin with, as well as the others, but now that Paul had left to look for his sister, Ryan was left with the building work and a group of helpers he was grateful to, but didn't know all that well. In his spare time, he had practiced his skills on smaller projects, such as Helena's wooden leg; now they were needed on the house and he needed something time-consuming to occupy his mind. The foundations and walls of the house had been built with carved stone and a rough mortar, now the floor had to go down and the roof go on. Perhaps this was a good thing, Cat thought, as it kept his mind off worrying about Salene.

The more time Cat spent at the farm, especially when Tai San was around, the more sure she became that Tai San must be taken into her and Lex's confidence. Whenever she was around, the girl watched her closely, giving her little or no time to herself. As Lex had not yet mastered the art of scrying, it was left to Cat to look for Salene through magical routes. Scrying, however, is a procedure best performed alone or in the company of those who know what you are doing, as the scrier is usually in a trance-like state, much deeper than your average daydream. If Cat was to try looking for Salene while Tai San was present, there was no doubt in her mind that the girl would draw her own conclusions, which would probably be the wrong ones.

Lex, on the other hand, had his own problems: he had a shadow. Ever since Jetta had seen him from the roof that night, she had kept a close eye on him and, not always known to Lex, followed him everywhere. It wasn't as if her Jack would notice, anyway, she told herself, as he had spent the last two days at the hotel with the computers and, as she thought, Ellie.

At the hotel, Jack had actually spent the past two days searching for Ved's files. For all that she thought she knew computers, Cloe hadn't known that simply deleting the files from the desktop did not mean they were gone for good. The file she had deleted was simply a shortcut to Ved's files, not the files themselves, and even if they had been, Jack would have been able to restore them. As it was, he simply had to hunt through all of the data and folders he had been looking through the first time he found the ex-Techno's program and re-create the shortcut file on the desktop. The only problem was that he had no idea where he had found them and the original search had taken a matter of weeks!


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

"Pride, calm down, we'll find her! _Cat, I need you down here as soon as possible!_" Lex's voice echoed through the mall as he called after a frantic Pride, while, in contrast, his discourse with his sister remained unheard even to those standing next to him.

"Lex, she's been gone for four days!" the young man returned in anguish, "I can't just sit here and do nothing!"

As Pride disappeared out the door, Lex sighed, thinking _"I don't need this!"_, before grabbing his coat and bolting out the door after the distraught Pride.

_"I heard that, little brother,"_ Cat's voice echoed in his head as he ran through the darkening streets.

_"I know. Is Tai San with you?"_

_"And watching me like a hawk!" _

_"What am I going to do?"_

_"You'll get by, you always do."_

_"Can you get away from my wife? You've seen more of her than I have these past few days!"  
"I'll make my way down to the city at first light tomorrow. Tai San is staying over at the farm again so I'll persuade her come down with me, which shouldn't be too difficult. We'll meet you at the old library, level five."_

_"I'll be there."_

--

Cloe sat in the corner of the basement, her knees brought up to her chest and her arms wrapped around them as she stared at the dark, cold floor, slowly rocking back and forwards.

"I've got him!" Jack exclaimed, the elation in his voice cutting through the silence like sunlight through the darkest storm-cloud.

--

Salene wandered aimlessly through the city suburbs. The houses were thinning now, but she didn't notice. Nor did she notice the hunger gnawing at her insides, the thirst drying her throat and lips, the cold night air cutting through her and chilling her to the bone or the blood running from a gash on her leg when she had stumbled over something unseen and treacherous. Her eyes were glazed. The only thing she could think about was finding him. They had taken him away, the Chosen, and now she had lost their baby, the one he had wanted so much. She had to find him, wherever they had taken him. She had to tell him, needed to tell him, that she was sorry, that it was all her fault, that she had lost their baby. She had to.

--

In a hut woven from branches and lined with grasses and old blankets, Amber lay, sleeping in Sasha's arms. Her son, Zac, lay nearby, sleeping soundly within the warmth of his blankets. Outside, the remains of a fire lay dormant like a sleeping guard and an owl hooted a warning as a shadow approached.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Dawn broke over the city. Fingers of sunlight slid searchingly into the darkened streets. People were lost. People were found. People were watching. People were being watched. For most of the city, however, people were asleep.

Those who weren't asleep made full use of the fact that there were others who were. Lex had found Pride and led him back to the Mall, declaring that they would search together during the light of day, then, at dawn, left the sleeping young man and headed for the old library. Jetta had, as always, followed him. Up until now, she had only managed to trace him to his den in the city, where he had entertained Siva in times past, and had only ever caught him reading or apparently meditating. She was sure there was something she was missing, however, and persisted in her task.

Cat had also arisen before dawn and, hoping to avoid saying goodbye to Alice and Aeryn, had gathered her things together before presenting herself at Tai San's door. When she raised her hand to knock, the petite girl opened the door and looked at her sister-in-law mildly.

"You are leaving," she stated.

"Yes," Cat answered.

"I am also leaving. I will walk to the city with you."

"Thank you, I would be glad of your company."

Taking up their respective bundles, the two young women quietly left the farm house, leaving behind only a note of thanks on the table for their hosts. Once they drew near to the city, Cat stopped and turned to Tai San.

"My destination is not the Mall, Tai San," she said, "I am heading for a building on the far side of the city centre and I would like you to accompany me there."

"I have been away from my husband for some time now," Tai San replied, "If we may stop off at the Mall so that I can see him, I will then come with you gladly."

"That would be a waste of time: Lex is already on his way to meet us at this place. He left the Mall at sunrise, a few minutes ago. He will be waiting for us when we arrive."

"How do you know that?"

"Come with me and we will show you."

"We?"

Cat turned and led Tai San through the city streets, past the area that contained the Mall. Tai San followed warily, her mind working as to what all of this could mean.

"Can you see the future?" Tai San said as the girls started climbing another hill.

"No, that is not for me to see."

"Then who is it for?"

"You are the one who saw Eagle mountain in your dreams: you should know."

They elapsed once more into silence as they reached the tall building that was the old university library. Tai San did not recognise any of this area of the city, but she immediately saw that one of the heavy oak-panelled doors stood slightly ajar. Following Cat through the door, she paused as her sister-in-law tapped a few keys on a panel in the wall, then followed her into the depths of the dimly lit building. Cat did not pause to explain anything as they wound their way up the staircase and Tai San only hesitated to briefly glance at the list of subjects next to the door they were entering once they reached level five.

Lex heard the door open and walked forward from the shadows to meet the girls. His wife stared at him as if she had seen a ghost. Lex's eyes involuntarily flicked to the floor then back to his sister.

"Shall we?" he asked.  


--  


Salene stumbled along the line of the edge of the forest. The route she had taken would have been unfamiliar to her even if she had been thinking straight; as it was, she merely saw a line of darkness, where the sunlight had not yet penetrated, and kept on the light side of it. The sun glared in her eyes, rudely, as if trying to awaken her from a trance or a dream. It made no difference. She only saw light and dark. She headed for the light.

An hour after sunrise, a shape began to form from the light. It was not until she was much closer that she could make out what it was. It was a house. It had no roof. She walked towards it. She went in.  


--  


Sasha woke at dawn, as he always did, and left their camp to fetch wood for the fire. By the time Amber opened her eyes, he had already started the fire and had a pot of water heating over it. The young mother checked her baby, who was sleeping soundly, and crawled out of the makeshift tent towards her lover.

"Good morning, my love," Sasha said as he leant forward to stir the fire.

"You should have woken me," Amber told him, pulling herself up to her feet and drawing her hands through her ringlets in a bid to disentangle them.

Sasha stood up and placed his hands on her waist.

"Now how could I do that, sweetness, when you looked so beautiful asleep."

He leaned in to kiss her softly. As he did so there came a growl from the bushes off to the side of their camp and something with the ferocity of a wild beast charged into Sasha's side and flung him away from Amber and to the ground. As she saw her former lover wrestle determinedly with her current one, Amber screamed in vain for him to stop. She tried to pull Bray up, off of Sasha, but was thrown backwards and to the ground, her head hitting off a nearby tree root as she fell. As her vision turned starry then blurred, Amber's eyes rested on the tent that still sheltered her infant son. For a second it seemed as if it started to glow, then, as her vision faded to black, the glow started to spread.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Jetta crouched by the door of the old library. Lex had been in there all morning with Cat and Tai San. She hadn't risked following Lex or the girls when they arrived and now she was starting to get cramp in her feet as she waited for them to emerge. She shifted uneasily, deciding detective work wasn't all excitement and intrigue. She wasn't aware that she was being watched.

--  


Ryan was late arriving at the house to work that day. In fact, because Alice had asked him to take Aeryn down to the city first, it was almost midday before he reached the growing building on the far side of the orchard. As soon as he reached the open doorway, however, he knew something was wrong.

Flattening himself against the wall, he crept, sideways, towards the entrance. Peering, tentatively, around the corner of the door frame, Ryan's eyes locked onto the intruder, lying curled up in the corner of the newly laid floor. Calling out to her, he rushed forward.

"Salene!" he cried, "Sal, can you hear me? Are you okay?"

A stupid question, he knew: of course she wasn't okay; how could she be after what she'd been through. But he wanted her to tell him that.

"Ryan?" Salene said, sleepily, as she struggled to sit upright and found herself in pain, her back stiff from the hard floor and the cold night.

"I'm here Sal," Ryan answered, almost skidding to kneel beside her and put his arm around her, "I'm right here, it's alright."

"I'm sorry..."

"Don't be, Sal, don't be. It's not your fault."

"I lost the baby..."

"I know, I know," Ryan pulled her close to him and up onto her feet as he spoke, "Come on now, let's get you back to the farm."

"T-the farm?"

"Yep. Alice is waiting. Come on, Sal."

"A-Alice? Is she working there today?"

"Yes," Ryan's brow creased: something wasn't right here.

"A-and the others, Ellie and Ned and KC and everyone, are they there too?"

"Sal...?"

"What about Luke? Is he there? He said he'd keep an eye on them."

"Sal, listen to me," Ryan stopped and held Salene with both hands so that she faced him. As soon as he looked into her eyes, he could see the genuine confusion and pain there. There was no point in adding to it just now.

"What? What's wrong, Ryan?"

"Nothing," he lied, "I was just going to say..."

"What?"

"I was just going to say that I love you. That I would never do anything to hurt you. I will always be here for you, Sal. You know that, right?"

"Y-yes."

"Well, come on then, they'll be waiting."

Leaning on Ryan's arm, Salene walked with him through the orchard towards the farm. She didn't recognise it as well as she used to. A lot had changed since she had last seen this area. Ah, well, she thought, I've not been here for a while, I suppose it would have changed.  


--  


They had reached the second outpost the night before and pitched camp there. Although some of the search party's number had been sent back to the city with new injured, there were still plenty others to help with this and the last known outpost. As Zed and May worked their way through some of the farther huts, Paul and his small team worked their way through the main control centre of the outpost. He was on his way down to the basement with three others. The rest of his team were on their way up to top of the building.

As Paul's team reached the bottom of the stairwell, they saw a long corridor stretch out on either side of them. Sending two of his companions in one direction, Paul and another boy, who could communicate with Paul through signs, headed along the other corridor. Most of the doors down here led into storage cupboards and, occasionally, small, empty rooms. At the end of the corridor, however, there was a set of double doors which appeared rimmed in a dull, grey light. A faint buzzing noise hummed through the doors and Paul's companion signed to him to tread carefully. When the boys reached the door, Paul gently tried the lock. It was open. They pushed the door open a crack and peered inside. There were no Techno's, that they could see, but there were row after row of trestles with zombie-like figures hooked up on them.

Paul and the other boy walked into the room and through the files of test subjects. It was as if the nightmare had started all over again. Suddenly, Paul stopped. One of the zombies was horribly familiar. The day he had hoped for, longed for and feared was here. He had found her.

Patsy.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Bray screamed like a madman as he flung a bruised and battered Sasha aside and raced toward the burning tent. Sasha could barely raise his body from the ground before the pain kicked in. Looking around he could see the burning tent, its doorway enveloped in flame, but the rear, where Zac lay, mercifully still intact. He glanced round for Amber and saw her lying, unconscious, next to a tree, her head resting on the root where it had landed, knocking her out.

Hearing Bray cough and yell in pain, Sasha turned his attention back to the flaming tent. The flames were spreading quickly and the supports of the tent would soon have burnt through. He tried to get up; tried to stand. The pain made him double over again as he tried to straighten his back. Catching his breath, he held on to a nearby branch for support and made his way around the fire to the tent. The heat was unbearable and he had to turn his face away.

A noise made Sasha look to the rear of the tent once more. The fabric of one corner, the one furthest from the flames, was being pushed up. Stumbling round to the opening, Sasha was met by Bray's hand. He lifted the side of the tent further and could see Bray's face peering out.

"Take the baby! Get him away from here!" Bray coughed, passing Zac out through the gap into Sasha's waiting arms.

Sasha did as he was told and carried Zac a safe distance from the now raging fire. He settled the child between the roots of a tree and turned to go back for Bray. Turning too quickly, his ribs complained and Sasha had to stop and catch his breath again. As he did so, he looked over to where Bray was struggling to get himself out of the all too small hole in the back of the tent. Sasha started off again towards him but had barely gone two steps forward when the burning supports finally gave way and the tent collapsed. Bray cried out in pain as burning wood and fabric landed on top of him. Sasha moved to help him as quickly as he could and cut the fabric of the tent with his knife, giving Bray enough room to drag himself through the gap.

"Where's Amber?" Bray gasped, the pain in his legs almost overpowering him.

"She's round the front," Sasha answered, "She was okay last I looked. Unconscious, but okay."

"Check on her. Get her out of reach of the fire."

Sasha hobbled off to where Amber was lying, still unconscious. He called her name and shook her gently and, as she groggily opened her eyes, she sat up, rubbing the back of her head. Feeling the warmth on the side of her face, she looked round.

"The tent! Zac! No!"

"It's okay, Amber, Bray got him out. They're round the back. Come on."

Amber followed Sasha round, leaning on his arm for support until she saw her son and ran towards him.

"Zac," she crooned, "Oh, my poor baby! Are you okay."

The child gurgled happily in reply to his mother's voice.

"Amber?" Bray said weakly.

Amber looked over to where his voice had come from. She had been about to reprimand him for the fight he had started that had led to the fire. Everything she and Sasha had had been in that tent, with the exception of the breakfast things. Then she saw his legs; they were badly burnt from the fire, his trousers still smouldering in some parts, were the material hadn't already been burnt into the flesh. His back was burned too, with great blisters on some of the less damaged areas and blackened skin on the worse ones.

"Bray!" Amber gasped; it was all she could manage.

"I-is he okay?"

"He's fine. Thank you. That was a brave thing you did."

"He's my son. There's nothing I wouldn't risk for him."

"I know."

"I had to see him again."

"I know you did. I shouldn't have taken him that way."

"But he's your son too, right?"

"Yes."

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Everything."

"It was my fault too. It was more mine than it was yours."

"But I loved you. I still love you. Both of you."

"I know. We both know."

Bray nodded then slumped forward to lie flat on his face. Amber didn't need to wipe the tears from her eyes to know he was dead; instead she turned away and let the tears fall freely. It was over. He had been such an important part of her life, now he was gone.

--

When Lex, Tai San and Cat emerged from the old library, Jetta sat up and watched with renewed interest. Lex had his arm around his wife, who was looking very contemplative. Cat looked as if she was saying something to Lex, but Jetta could have sworn she never said a thing: she was close enough to have heard even a whisper in this silent part of the city. Lex nodded to Cat and the older girl walked off in what Jetta figured would be the direction of the hospital, while Lex and Tai San turned and headed back the way Jetta had come that morning, following Lex. They were on their way back to the mall. As Jetta rose to follow Lex and Tai San, she heard a noise behind her. Spinning round, she only caught a brief glimpse of a face she recognised before there was a sharp pain in the side of her head and she fell to the ground, unconscious.

--

Alice looked up at the sound of the farmhouse door opening and gasped.

"Salene!" she cried, dropping her rolling pin and rushing to the ex-City Leader's side.

Ryan, on the other side of Salene, looked over to Alice.

"She's a little confused," he said gently.

"Let's get you into a chair, Sal," Alice said, leading Salene to an old and battered armchair by the hearth.

"Shouldn't you be working?" Salene asked, worriedly, "W-won't you get in trouble for stopping to help me?"

"No, honey," said Alice, with a slightly bemused expression, "we'll be just fine. Come on, sit down here."

Having deposited Salene in the chair, Alice offered her some tea, which Salene gratefully accepted. When Ryan went to help Alice, and tell her what had happened when he had found Sal, the bereaved young mother was sitting in the armchair, staring at the fire and rocking slowly back and forth. Ryan cast one look back at her before turning to speak to Alice.

"I found her at the new house," he told her, "She was curled up, asleep; I think she's been there all night!"

"What was she like when you woke her?"

"She told me she'd lost the baby. I said I knew. She kept apologising. I talked her into coming back to the farm with me. She asked if we were all still working here. She asked if Luke were here. Alice, she asked if Ellie was here! It's as if she's gone back to when she lost the first baby. As if she's forgotten everything that happened in between."

"Everything? The Technos? Her being City Leader? Aeryn turning up? Jack coming back, going away again then coming back again? Everything? Pride?"

"It looks like it. It's the only way I can explain the things she keeps saying. About Luke. About working here."

"About getting in trouble if we stop to help her?"

"Exactly. What do you think we should do?"

"Get this tea into her then get her to the hospital."

"Sounds like a plan!"

--

"Patsy? Patsy!" May called the prostrate figures name as she shook the young girl gently.

Paul and Jon, the boy he was with when they found her, stood behind May and Kaz as they tried to wake Paul's sister. Kaz was dabbing a wet rag over Patsy's face with one hand, while she checked the girl's pulse with the other.

"It's there," she said, "but it's weak. We need to get her back to the hospital. There are a lot like her here."

"There's only one more outpost," May said, "It's only a day's journey from here. Once we've got that one emptied, we'll be on our way home."

"I don't want to risk it. That's adding at least another two days onto the journey, I want to get Patsy and the others back to the city as fast as I can."

"Then we split our groups. You go with Paul and his team and head back for the city with as many casualties as you can take and Xaviour and I will go on to the next outpost with our teams."

"No," Kaz told her, firmly, "You're going to need me with you in case we meet anything like this or worse. I'm the best medic you've got. These people need better care than anyone could give them in the field, apart from that there isn't much that I could do for them that anyone couldn't do. It would be better if someone else took my place and I went on with you."

"I'll go," said Zed, walking over.

"But Xaviour, I need you here!" May wailed.

"No, you don't," he replied, "and PLEASE call me Zed!"


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

"What do we do now?" Sasha asked as he carried Zac to his mother.

"We could just bury him here and carry on travelling," Amber suggested.

"You know that's not right. The others at the Mall would want to know. Besides, your tribe has their own burial ground. He would want to be buried there. We have to return to the city; for supplies if nothing else. The fire took almost everything we have."

"I know, it's just ..."

"You can't face them?"

"Exactly."

"But they're your tribe. They would welcome you back, you know that. Especially Trudy."

"I did promise her I'd go back didn't I."

"You did. And don't you want to know if she's still with Hawk? You had a hand in getting them together after all."

"Ye-es," Amber looked uncomfortably thoughtful, as if she was being forced to think about something she had depended on never having to think about again, "But we'd never make it back to the city today. Not even if we started out right now. We need somewhere to stop on the road for the night."

"Then all the more reason to head back to the city: you were saying only yesterday that we were getting close to the Eco's camp again. We could head for there, spend the night with them and then go on to the city tomorrow."

"But so much will have changed. I don't even know who their leader is now. Pride and I left and, as far as I know, Trudy is still in the city with Hawk."

"Well then it's time to find out," Sasha smiled at his beloved as he extended a hand to help her up and then passed her her son, "You take Zac and I'll get the remainder of our things together."

"What about Bray?"

"Leave him to me. I think I can fashion some sort of trestle out of the larger logs lying around here."

Amber nodded and turned away. She didn't want Sasha to see her crying over another man. He wouldn't have been jealous, she knew, but she didn't want him to see all the same. She had loved Bray once, but so much had happened since then. She had lost him for a long time. Not as long as Sasha had been gone, admittedly, but then the reason there had been no future for her and Sasha back then was because she wasn't the person she was now. It wasn't Bray or Sasha who had changed, it was her, and it wasn't fair that, ultimately, Bray had lost his life because of it.

--

Aeryn reached the hospital long before Cat, but busied herself with going round the wards and meeting the new staff. The hospital was running nicely now, albeit there was still much more need for it than she or any of the staff would have liked. May and Zed's search team were not the only ones still out there and there would be a steady stream of casualties every one or two weeks for a few days, then quiet periods where everyone tried to cope with the recent influx of high maintenance patients. The news of the hospital had spread through the surrounding countryside as well and there would be people coming from miles away just to receive their care, either for themselves or a loved one.

Aeryn headed up to the first floor, taking the stairs one at a time and slowly because of her substantial bump. When she reached the landing she was met by Angie on her way back from checking on some new recruits.

"Aeryn, what are you doing up here?" Angie cried, hurrying forward and putting her arm around Aeryn for support, "You could go into labour at any time, you should be downstairs, not wandering about up here on your own! Josh!"

"I'm fine," Aeryn told her as Josh hurried over, "I just thought I'd come up and see you. Plus I'm not on my own, am I? You're here."

"Now you know that's not the point. Josh, take Aeryn's other arm and we'll escort her into the ward."

"Where you can keep an eye on me?"

"Precisely."

"I'm pregnant, not an invalid!"

"You're doing as I say."

"I'll go back down with you again later," Josh added, "If you want."

"Honest, I'll be ... Ow!"

"Can, I please say 'I told you so'?" Angie's voice rang with sarcasm.

"The ward sounds good!" Aeryn said through gritted teeth.

"Let's go."

As the three hurried to the ward in a mass waddle, Angie shouted directions at the other nurses to prepare a side room for Aeryn and clear up the mess in the hallway where her waters had broken. They crossed the newly set up ward before the next contraction came, but Aeryn's screams ensured Patch and Dee got the message downstairs very quickly.

--

Jack awoke to see Cloe peering down at him worriedly from one side and Jay on the other. He was in one of the old bedrooms in the hotel, lying on the bed in the middle of the room.

"You okay, Jack?" Jay asked, "You've been out for the count for a while now."

"Y-yeah, w-what happened?"

"You passed out," Cloe said, softly, "I thought you'd come round sooner, but when you didn't I got Jay."

"How long have I been out for?"

"Not sure," Jay answered, "about ten, fifteen minutes, maybe."

"Not so much, only ten," Cloe cut in, "It wasn't that long before I went to get you."

"I don't know what happened," Jack said, confused, "One minute I was working on the computer, then the next I woke up here."

--

When Jetta came round she was in a darkened room, tied to a chair. It was so dark around her that she could barely make out the shape of figures moving in front of her.

"Chrisma!"

"Oh look, she's awake. I didn't think I hit her hard enough," Chrisma's voice taunted from the darkness.

"Ten minutes was enough to get her here and tied up," said another voice, she didn't recognise it, but it was female, "It was enough this time, though I suggest you try harder in future."

"Enough," said another female voice, "we have no time to be worrying over things that are past now. It is the future that concerns us. The past is dead, it cannot be altered."


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

The sun was sinking towards the West when Amber, Zac and Sasha arrived with Bray's corpse in tow. Amber looked around gratefully as the members of her former tribe came forward to welcome her. She hadn't been certain that she would be welcome here after running out on Bray the way she had. She dreaded her return to the city even more.

"Lynx," said Amber, addressing one of her old friends, "who's in charge here now?"

"That would be Wolf and Badger," replied the young man who had been whittling an arrow until Amber's arrival.

"Who?" asked Amber, puzzled, shifting the weight of her growing son from one arm to the other. She had never heard those names before.

"I am Wolf," said a voice from behind Amber. She spun round and found herself looking up into a face she recognised.

"Nocona!" Amber cried, smiling, "So you did leave the city! Are Naduah and Avenir here too?"

"Yes, they are in your old hut. They're waiting for you. We came out here about six months ago, on Trudy and Hawk's advice, and joined the Gaians. Hawk said they needed a strong leader now that you had left and he thought Naduah fitted the bill. But I'm called Wolf now, Naduah is called Badger and our daughter is called Lori, short for Lorikeet. Come up and see them."

"I will, but the business I have here is not really of the socialising sort. We have to return to the city."

"But you will shelter here tonight?"

"Yes, if we may. Can we take this discussion into the hut? I have some bad news."

Leaving Sasha with the makeshift cart bearing Bray's covered remains, Amber followed Nocona, or Wolf as he was now called, up to the leader's hut. As soon as she entered, Naduah's head snapped up and after a few seconds she spoke.

"Amber? It is you isn't it? You have your son with you?"

"Yes, it's me. I have Zac right here. Naduah ... "

"It's Badger now."

"Sorry, Badger, Sasha and I, and Zac of course, are on our way back to the city. We want to stay the night here but that means bringing something into the camp that others may not want here."

"What?" asked Wolf as he moved over to his wife and daughter's side.

"Bray's body. It's a long story, but he died this morning and we wanted to bury him at Eagle mountain with the other Mall Rats. For that, we need to tell the others in the city."

"How did he die?" Badger asked after a moment's pause.

"Our tent caught fire: he saved Zac and died in the process."

"Heroic."

"Yes. He deserves a proper burial, where his old friends can say goodbye."

"Old friends and old lovers."

"Yes," Amber's eyes flicked to the ground as she said this.

"It shouldn't be a problem," Badger said, inclining her head towards Wolf for his response, "the others will understand."

"They will," Wolf agreed, "and we have somewhere he can lie tonight. Lynx and I will help Sasha with him. You know where the guest tents are."

Amber nodded, the tears starting to show themselves in her eyes. She got up to leave and, carrying Zac past Lori's crib, paused at the door and half turned as if to say something, then stopped.

"They will welcome you home," Badger said, answering her unasked question, "They are your tribe, your family. More so than the Gaians ever were. Besides, they will need you soon."

Amber nodded again and headed out into the cool, evening air.

--

Trudy sat down at the table in the cafe. Hawk sat next to her and put his arm around her protectively, laying a hand on the small bump that was forming below Trudy's abdomen. Trudy smiled up at him then returned to the matter in hand. Lex, Tai San, Alice Ryan and Salene all sat around the table she was at. Salene was the centre of attention.

The ex-City Leader was sitting between Ryan and Alice on one side of the table, opposite Trudy, with Brady in her lap. It was Brady that confused her the most: the child had changed so much, had grown so much. Perhaps they were right. Perhaps she had lost her memory. Everything was so unclear, so muddled. She was sitting here with Ryan by her side and a fuming, tearful black-haired young man outside the cafe door, which had been shut in his face by Lex, who said he was now City Leader and that she had been City Leader before him. And there was Trudy, the Supreme Mother, sitting there in the early stages of pregnancy with a young man who looked as if he were not from the city, but bore similar markings to the black-haired young man outside, and was definitely not either Zoot or the Guardian, yet he was claiming to be the father of the Supreme Mother's baby.

There was so much to take in. Tai San had tried to explain some of it to her, with Lex and Trudy filling in gaps. Ryan just watched her worriedly.

--

Jack, still shaken from his blackout, returned to the Mall with Jay on one side of him and Cloe on the other. They didn't remove the support of their arms until he was sitting safely on the edge of the fountain.

"I still think you should let us take you to hospital," said Jay, "I'm supposed to be there with Ebony myself! It's not as if I'd be going out of my way!"

"No, I'm fine," Jack protested, "Just a little shaken up, that's all. I'll have a lie down then I'll be fine: you'll see."

"What's going on Pride?" Cloe called up the Gaian on the landing.

"Ryan found Salene," Pride sobbed, "She doesn't remember the baby! She doesn't remember me! She thinks she's still in love with Ryan! They're trying to tell her what's going on, but I don't think it'll do much good. If they would just let me talk to her! But Tai San seems to think that she's best with those she recognises for now! AARRGGHH!"

Pride nursed the hand he had just punched the wall with. Walls were always a lot harder than one expected when one did something like that!

"We should go up," said Jack, turning to look at Cloe, "She'll know us."

Cloe nodded and helped him to his feet. Jay moved to follow them but Jack waved him aside.  
"We'll be fine. Sal won't know you. Go to Ebony. Go on."

Jay nodded and headed out of the Mall.

--

Aeryn sat up in the bed, cradling her newborn son in her arms.

"Any ideas on what to call him?" Angie asked.

"Especially since you were determined he didn't exist until he started kicking!" laughed Skye, who had been training on the upper ward.

"I think I'll call him after his father," Aeryn mused, looking in wonder at the tiny creature staring back up at her, "He has his eyes. And his smile."

"You're gonna call him Mega?" Josh asked, wrinkling his nose slightly, "No disrespect, but he doesn't really look like he'd suit the name. Plus, the Techno's are gone now and that's a Techno name."

"Don't worry," Aeryn smiled, "I was going to call him his father's real name, Micah, or Mikey as we will be living with Alice after all!"

A scream echoed from downstairs, swiftly followed by vehement cursing.

"That'll be Ebony!" Angie cried and, followed by Patch and Dee, who had been standing nearby, she raced out of the room, across the ward and down the stairs.


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Ebony was in labour. Ebony wasn't supposed to be in labour yet. Ebony was lucky she was where she was.

"Get her into the operating theatre, NOW!" Cat shouted at the new nursing staff on the ground floor, "And somebody find Patch!"

"We're here," Patch called, racing up with Dee and Angie next to him.

"She's gone into premature labour, but the baby's coming too fast. With her build, there's no way she'll be able to deliver it naturally that fast. We'll have to open her up."

Patch nodded and sent Angie and his wife off for the necessary supplies, then followed Cat to scrub up. He still left the surgical side of things to her if he could. Thankfully the only cases he'd had to operate on while she had been away were never too complicated. This was another matter entirely, and it was Ebony!

Ebony screamed again. Dee and Angie returned with the supplies and started to scrub up themselves just as Jay arrived. He heard the screams and rushed to the operating theatre.

"Ebony!" he cried, panicking. He should have been there earlier, he told himself.

"Jay? Where the hell have you been! Do not think you are getting out of this one without pain! You got me into this mess!"

Jay was slightly taken aback by Ebony's accusation, it had been her idea, after all, but when another scream cut through the air around him, he dashed forward again, only to be stopped by Dee.

"Out!" the pink haired nurse commanded, "we need space to work. Don't worry about her: women almost always hate the guy that got them up the spout when it comes to the hard part. It'll pass once the baby's here."

She slammed the theatre door in his face and left him standing looking through the window in the door at the chaos ensuing inside.

"She's in good hands," said a voice from his side. It was Skye.

"I know. But it doesn't stop me worrying."

"Come on," Skye took his arm, leading him toward the stairs, "Aeryn's upstairs with her new baby. It's a boy."

Jay nodded and followed her.

--

Jack and Cloe sat around the table with Salene and the other original Mall Rats. Salene looked at Jack strangely: of all of them, he had changed the most in looks, being a good deal taller, with darker hair and a less babyish look to his face. Cloe had grown up a lot in looks too. They had to be right. She must have amnesia. She was so scared. Apparently, there was a young man outside the door who loved her, passionately, and she couldn't remember a single thing about him.

Eventually, she noticed Jack looking weary and asked if he was alright. He answered that he was fine, just a little tired. Getting up, he said he thought he'd go have a lie down for a while. Lex said that perhaps they were all getting tired and they should all take a break. Tai San told Salene, reassuringly, that a rest would help, and that only time and rest would bring her memory back, but she was sure it would come back, bit by bit. Salene nodded and clung to Ryan as the others departed.

--

Jetta was hungry, thirsty and had a pounding headache. She saw Chrisma and her two companions huddled around a table in the corner of the room, deep in conversation. Where Jetta was sitting, bound to a chair in the centre of the room, meant that there was no way she could even edge the chair nearer the wall without her captors noticing. She wondered how long it would take for anyone to notice that she was gone, for Jack to notice. He's probably too caught up in working with Ellie, she thought.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Amber, Zac, Sasha and the remains of Bray arrived back in the Mall just in time to hear Jack scream. Amber set off at a run for the old electronics store while the other Mall Rats piled out of the cafe up the stairs and headed in the same direction. When Amber reached Jack's doorway, Zac still cradled in one arm, she was relieved to see the young man sitting up in his bed as if he had only had a nightmare. What did worry her though was the sweat pouring off her friend's deathly white face and the worried look he wore.

"Jack, what's wrong," she cried, running in to sit next to him on the bed as the others poured into the doorway.

"J-Jetta! H-Have to find Jetta!"

"You're in no fit state to find anyone, Jack. What's wrong?"

Lex came up behind Amber and circled round to sit on the other side of the bed. Zac immediately hid his head in his mother's side and started bawling his eyes out.

"What did you see, Jack?" Lex asked, urgently.

To Amber and the other Mall Rats, the question seemed almost absurd: surely he'd just had a nightmare or something and felt a bit guilty for spending so much time at the hotel. the only faces unperturbed by Lex's query were those of Tai San, Jack and Lex himself.

"Sh-she was in a warehouse," Jack gasped, his breathing still erratic from the shock, "i-in the middle, tied up to a chair. Th-they were taunting her. T-Took some blood. Th-they hurt her!"

Amber started to worry as Jack's voice began to shake and the tears showed. Lex obviously felt the same and he waved everyone except his wife and Amber. Once they were gone, he turned to Amber.

"Amber, it's nice to have you back and all," Lex said with a gentleness that surprised her, "but this isn't something Zac should see or hear. Please: go with the others, do some catching up, send Pride out to find Jetta, it'll give him something else to worry about rather than Salene. Trudy will fill you in on everything. Go on now."

He'd changed in the past nine months, Amber thought. Maybe the City Leadership had done him some good. But there did seem to be a lot to catch up on. For starters, Amber wanted to know why Pride was worried about Salene. She hoped it wasn't the same depression Trudy had gone through when Brady was born. As she left the room to returned to Sasha and find the others, she heard Lex speaking gently to Jack.

--

"From the top, Jack: what did you see?" Lex said, softly, trying to calm the younger man.

"I-I ... It was so real, s-so real ... I-I was right there, y'know? Standing right behind her. A-And I could see them there. R-Right in front of us. Th-three of 'em a-and one in the, the shadows a-at the wall."

"Who?"

"I-I dunno ... That c-c-cow from the hospital, the one th-that lorded it over e-everyone. A-And another two I didn't know. I-I couldn't see the one further back. T-Too dark."

"What did they do?"

"One of them h-had and knife a-and sh-she cut Jetta's hair, her hair, a-and then, then .."

"Jack, calm down, it's okay, just tell us what happened."

"Sh-she c-cut ..." Jack lifted a shaking hand and dragged a line down one side of his face with one finger, "A-And she caught the blood i-in a glass thing, v-vial or something."

"Did anyone say anything?"

"J-Jetta screamed. Th-the one I knew l-laughed, she laughed, and she said that n-now Jetta would do a-as she was told. Wh-what did she mean Lex? Wh-what were they doing?"

"I don't know, Jack, I'll have to think about it. But we'll get people out there looking for her right now. Pride should already be gone and he's the best tracker we've got."

"H-He has his own worries."

"This'll help take his mind off them a little. Get some sleep now: you'll need your rest after that," Lex rose to go and Tai San moved to the door, "One more thing, Jack."

"Wh-what?"

"Has this ever happened before? Seeing what Jetta sees or anything like that?"

"I-I kinda remember s-some kind of dream when I blacked out earlier, b-but nothing else."

"Okay, try and get some rest now. Leave it to us."

Jack nodded and lay down on his bed as Lex and Tai San let the curtain fall back over the doorway. When they reached the cafe, they found it a hive of activity. Hawk, Pride and Ryan had set off into the city, Ryan heading up to the farm first to fetch Slade from the new house. Amber, Salene and Trudy were sitting in a huddle around one table with Mouse, Brady and Zac clinging to each of their real and adopted mothers. Salene had a confused look on her face as Mouse tried to comfort her. Zac clung to his mother in his usual manner while Brady sat on Trudy's knee, patting her mother's tearstained face. Alice and Sasha were downstairs taking care of Bray's body while Sammy was helping Cloe make tea for the others.

"What is it?" Lex asked, "I would have thought you would be happy to be reunited!"

"Bray's dead, Lex," Amber replied, causing another cry from Trudy, "There was a fire, he saved Zac, but he couldn't save himself. We brought him home to bury him."

"We meaning you two and Sasha I take it?"

"Yeah, he's downstairs with Alice right now. She said she'd see to the body."

"And the others have gone after Jetta?" Tai San asked.

Amber nodded as Cloe came over with the tea.

"Do you want some?" she asked Lex and Tai San, "There's plenty in the pot."

"Yeah," Lex sighed taking a seat slightly away from the other women and his wife, "tea would be great, I just need to think for a while."

Cloe brought the tea as Lex sat with his head in his hands, thinking. At the other table, Tai San tried to turn the conversation to more cheerful items. Thankfully, someone had warned Amber of Salene's situation, so no-one put their foot in it, but once the obvious news of Trudy's pregnancy was out of the way, things seemed to go down hill again. Cloe mentioned that Jay had just left about half an hour ago to see Ebony at the hospital, which brought everyone on to the much more fruitful discussion of what kind of mother Ebony might make, which led on to the news of Aeryn's arrival at the hospital that morning as she was due. Eventually the conversation quietened down and Brady turned to watch Lex with suspicious eyes. Zac continuously hid his face in his mother's side as before, but Brady tilted her head to one side, as if listening.

"M'mma?" the little girl asked, interrupting her mother in full flow over the new decor of the nursery, "hooz uncalex talkin to?"

Lex's head snapped up. There was no way she could have heard. He looked round, right at Brady, with a confused look on his face. The little girl flinched and Trudy put one hand up to her daughter's head to soothe her.

"Uncle Lex wasn't talking to anyone honey?" Trudy said, puzzled, then she laughed, "Not unless you can hear things I don't!"

"She probably just saw his lips moving," Tai San said, quickly, "he does that a lot when he thinks."

"Uh, yeah," Lex nodded an affirmative then turned back to his tea and got up, "I think I'll take this to my room, leave you guys in peace to gossip."

"Don't leave me!" Sammy wailed, he didn't want to be the only talking male in a group of gossiping women.

"Oh, don't worry, Sammy," Lex smiled, "I'm sure they'll need plenty more tea before they're done."

--

At the hospital, things were and were not going well. As far as Ebony was concerned the operation was a swift success and Patch had finished the stitches and taken her through to what did for a post-op ward. Ebony's, however, was not the only life at risk during the caesarian. Cat and Patch had found not one but two babies in Ebony's womb. The twins would have been small enough had they been born at full term, now both of them were premature and the hospital still did not have any working incubators. Yes, Zac had been born prematurely and had survived, but he had not had a twin, hadn't been born quite so early and even then had been extremely lucky. Now Dee and Angie were cleaning the infants up in one corner of the operating theatre while Cat seemingly mused over the occurrences of the day.

_"The one he knew will be Chrisma, brother. He witnessed her theatrical exit from the hospital just after he returned, when he first met Jetta."_

_"Do you think she'll be alright?"_

_"Oh yes, from what he said, it sounds as if they'll have to keep her alive and in good condition."_

_"Why? What are they doing?"_

_"It sounds like Chrisma wants to try to do a control spell. Once Jetta is under her control, they'll probably send her back to us with some story of having needed time alone for something. Who knows what."_

_"Why only try? You don't think they are powerful enough?"_

_"Oh, they're powerful enough, make no mistake. They managed that curse during the elections, although it was one of the more simple ones. No, the reason they'll have trouble with this is Jack."_

_"Jack? The poor guy's hysterical! What could he do?"_

_"He doesn't have to do anything. Think, little brother. Magic can only lie to the mind, not the heart. Why do you think Jack could see all that happening? Why do you think he had that dream he said he couldn't remember when he passed out? Why do you think he passed out in the first place?"_

_"Jetta?"_

_"Right. It doesn't happen with everyone. I've only known it to happen to three couples in my lifetime. Jack and Jetta and Aeryn and Mega were two of those three. It's a link that can only happen between soulmates and only when they are in trouble. With Aeryn and Mega, it was so that Mega could warn her of the project he'd found and so that Aeryn could fulfil her vow: he was dying. With Jetta and Jack, it's a warning, a cry for help. She's letting us know that something is wrong while she still can. If, and only if, they do succeed, I've no idea what they might make her do. Their only weakness is that Chrisma obviously doesn't know about Jack. They've spent so much time apart, with Jack working at the hotel, that even if she was spying on Jetta and the rest of us, Chrisma might not notice that they were so close. That advantage can't last forever, though. We have to find her."_

_"I know. I'm on it. One more thing. Brady?"_

_"Can hear everything we say. She sees me as a forty-year-old too. Magic has no effect on the very young: they look with their hearts, not their minds. Be careful around her. She can see through the glamours magic casts to hide itself: any magic you or Tai San work in her presence will be immediately obvious to her."_

_"And Zac?"_

_"Sees and hears, but does not understand. He is still too young to make any sense of what he notices other than to be afraid. That is why he hides. You are luck that Mouse is just too old to notice: she would know exactly what was going on. But it is that same sensibility that makes her too old to see or hear any of our secrets. One other thing. Keep Brady and Zac away from Jack when he is asleep. I don't know if they would sense anything there, but I'd rather not risk it, for his sake at least."_

_"Yeah, the kids seem to hate me now: they're terrified!"_

_"They feel the same way towards me, or at least, Brady does and Zac will when I meet him. Warn Tai San. Don't let them catch her out too."_

_"I will do. How are your patients?"_

_"Ebony seems none the worse for the operation, but we'll know more once the sedative wears off. Her twins will need to be monitored closely and kept warm: they're very small."_

_"Twins?"_

_"Yes, not quite the cause for jubilation these days as they might once have been."_

_"And Aeryn?"_

_"A boy. Micah, after his father."_

_"I thought ..."_

_"Well you didn't think Mega was his real name?"_


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Aeryn was a bad patient. She should have been staying in bed, following Patch's orders, but no: she had to be up and about, helping. She carried her newborn son in a sling close to her chest as she went round the wards with Angie. Eventually, Angie had work to do that Aeryn couldn't help with, so Aeryn went downstairs and braved Patch's reprimand. Patch, however, was in a good mood, as was his wife and Cat: since Angie had returned to her rounds upstairs, and Jay had returned to Ebony's side, they had been watching over the twins, two girls, and both seemed to be doing fine in the makeshift incubators Patch had put together. Dee was busy watching over the new arrivals, broodily, while her husband filed through many books on the dangers awaiting premature babies and how to avoid or counteract them. Cat, on the other hand, seemed preoccupied with something entirely different and after disappearing for a time, had locked herself in the office, with the blinds shut.

This was how Aeryn happened to be the only person with any great medical experience or knowledge to be present in the main ward when Paul, Jon and Zac, with a number of other helpers and walking wounded, arrived with their newest casualties, one of whom was Paul's twin sister, Patsy.

--

Cat sat, cross-legged, on the floor of the office. In front of her was a battered tin bowl, well settled in it's equally battered tin stand, half filled with twigs and dried leaves. Cat held both her hands forward, over the bowl, and murmured a few words in Latin. The bowl of twigs and leaves sprang into flame. Cat dropped her hands to her knees and concentrated her gaze on the flames.

Many people can scry without knowing it: they look up to the clouds, or down into a stream or river, or even into raindrops on a window pane and they go into a daze and see pictures forming in their mind. These people have little or no control over what they see, however, and their scrying takes the form of daydreams often lost and then recognised later as episodes of deja vu. Those who can control their visions can use them with great effect: to look for omens or direct prophecies of the future, although that is a gift reserved for only a few; to search the surrounding area for danger; or even, as long as they have seen them in the flesh, to find one particular person and see at least part of the area around them.

--

Lex was feeling the pressure of the City Leader's position far more keenly than anyone could have realised, besides his wife and sister, and perhaps Brady. Not only did he have a funeral to help organise and attend, a funeral of an old and respected friend, but he also had another old friend recovering from a severe memory loss and a third half-crazed with worry over his girlfriend! Plus he, Cat, Tai San and now possibly Brady all knew that, while said girlfriend may not be in any personal danger, the very cause of her apparent safety put them all in jeopardy! Add to that one young, just-learning-how-to-tell-everyone-everything, eavesdropper, and Lex's life was becoming very complex indeed!

--

Helena sat in a corner of the cafe, watching Salene. She had been so close: so close to finally hooking the man of her dreams, her hero, and now this had to go and happen. She felt sorry for Pride, not merely for the pain and confusion he must be going through, but because her wish for the return of Salene's memory was not to ease his suffering, but her own. Once again, Salene needed help and once again, Ryan came running.


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

"Players, coming through!" Zed shouted as he, Paul, Jon and the others brought in their casualties.

The cry went up and rang through the hospital, echoing from ward to ward as the recently trained staff came running to help. When the players arrived, the other wards were left under minimum care: the main ward needed all the help they could get!

Aeryn rushed to Zed's side as he commanded those around him.

"What's happened?" Aeryn cried above the bustling noise, "Where's May?"

"We had to leave her and Kaz to go on with the search," Zed replied, in between orders, "there were still more outposts to be searched, but these people needed to get back here as soon as. Come on, over here."

Zed led Aeryn over to a nearby bed upon which lay a young girl of about Cloe's age, maybe a little younger, with bedraggled black and blonde striped hair. Paul was sitting on the side of her bed, holding one of her hands in his and rubbing her forearm with the other. He was rocking back and forth in an alarming manner and didn't realise Aeryn was beside him until she put her hand on his shoulder. It struck Aeryn as odd: for all his deafness, Paul could usually sense the approach of others with ease. Feeling her touch, Paul looked up. He pointed to Patsy in an agitated manner, then patted his chest, repeating the motion several times while trying to form words.

"Sister!" was the only word Aeryn could make out, but it was all that she needed to know. Leaning down and taking Patsy's pulse, then placing a hand against her brow for signs of fever, Aeryn busily assessed her patient. She turned to give a few cheering words to Paul to allay his immediate fears, then hurried off to get Cat and Patch. They, with Dee, met her on the way from the new neonatal ward. As Aeryn told them of the situation, another ruckus erupted in the background and the four hurried back to the main ward.

When they reached the ward, chaos met their eyes. The players were up and playing the game, whichever game it was they had been programmed to play. Paul lay unconscious on the floor as Jon tried to restrain Patsy and Zed and a girl tried to restrain a larger young man. The girl suddenly got flung to one side and the man turned to Zed. After ducking and blocking a few blows, Zed caught the young man with a swift punch and he went down unconscious. Soon all the players had subsided into unconsciousness once more and the hospital staff went on with checking over both old and newly gained injuries. Aeryn and Jon attended Paul, who had now been brought round.

"He wants to know how Patsy is," Jon translated.

"She's no better," Aeryn sighed, "but at least she's no worse."

After answering a few more of Paul's questions, translated by Jon, Aeryn left the two boys to converse between themselves in sign language.

--

The cold water on Jetta's face brought her out of her dizzy slumber. She felt sick and groggy and her cheek stung. She looked up. Through blurred vision, she could make out Chrisma's outline.

"Wh-why are you doing this?" She spat.

Chrisma slapped her backhanded across her face. Now the other cheek stung. In his bed, Jack stirred and frowned.

"Why?" Chrisma cried, laughing, "Why should I tell you? What is there to stop you telling the others? Oh yes, that's right. Now I remember: a little ceremony. We're going to have a little ceremony," Chrisma's voice became sing-song and childish, "And you, little Jetta, are going to be guest of honour! Haha! Then you'll see what we're doing; what we want. Then you'll come over to us and do just what we want. Hm. I think you'll find or little group rather ... irresistible! Once the ceremony is finished, of course!"

"I'll never join you!" Jetta cried, with as much force and feeling as she could muster, "Never!"

"Never!" Jack mumbled as he slept.

"Oh, but you will," Chrisma continued, "And then you'll help us. You'll go back to your little _home _in that _mall _with your little _friends _and you'll _betray _them. You'll _watch _and you'll _wait _and you tell us _everything _that's going on, whether you want to or not. And then, piece... by ... piece... you'll destroy _every one of them_!"

--

Once the wounds had been treated and the casualties treated as best they could be, Cat returned to the office and locked the door behind her.

"What have you been up to?" Aeryn said suddenly.

Cat jumped and turned to face her. Aeryn was sitting in the darkened corner of the office, cradling Micah in her arms.

"Aeryn!" Cat sighed, "I didn't know you were there."

"Who were you looking for?"

"Hm?"

"The bowl of fire. You were scrying. There are fires all over the place, why take the risk of someone finding you in here?"

"Well, they didn't did they?"

"I did."

"Hmm."

"So who were you looking for? May?"

"No, Jetta."

"Jetta?"

"Hmm. She's been kidnapped. Jack's been having nightmares. Chrisma's behind it, but that's all we can get from him. He doesn't realise that what he sees is real and actually happening. He just thinks it's his fears coming to the surface. I wouldn't even bother trying to explain it to him: he's a scientist, the less he knows of magic the better. And the fewer people know of us the better too. But that'll be hard soon."

"How so?"

"Chrisma's going to use Jetta in a spell. A control spell. My bet is that she'll then try to use her to infiltrate and destroy the Mall Rats. She's still sore that we got past her little curses at the election. She knows we have magic on our side, and she'll take that into account, therefore, she fights with magic. We will very soon have, perhaps even already have, a war on our hands. A silent war. A war fought with magic. One that the city cannot know about. If the general populous knew that a magician ruled the city, there would be a rebellion. The whole city would be in uproar! Regardless of the fact that there's no malice in Lex's magic!"

"I'll help if I can."

"I know," Cat placed a hand on Aeryn's shoulder, "I know. That at least gives us four magi to their three. At least we think that's all they have. Jack said he saw a fourth in the shadows, but until we get a closer look, we won't know. I hope we don't have to use your powers, they're better kept for healing than fighting."

"That's what you always taught me."

"So," Cat decided it was time to change the subject, "Why were you hiding in here, in the dark?"

"Micah needed somewhere dark and quiet to calm him. The excitement outside made him fretful. Besides, I though I saw you sneak out of here when Dee and Patch came running through. I figured that, if you did, you'd probably come back in here so I came in and waited. I wanted you to meet your new grandson properly."

_"Grandson!"_

"Shhh," Cat said hurriedly, "Careful, Aeryn, they can't know!"

"I know, but they won't hear you in here. Do you know how long it's been since we talked, Mum?"

"I know, honey, I know. One day, I'll teach you more and we can talk without worrying about being overheard, well by most people, like your uncle and I do."

"How did he manage to learn so much so quickly?"

"I ... It's complicated. He's my brother, so there's a blood link there, I tried to pass on information to him, using magic, and it activated the link. It was an accident: he didn't just get the information I wanted him to get: he got a lot of my memories and knowledge, as well as my skills. Because of that link, we can talk whenever we want, and even when we don't; well, I can tune out your uncle, but he still hasn't learnt how to tune me out ..."

_"Don't I know it!"_

"... When you're ready, I'll teach you, but not before. It was Lex's getting used to the link that caused Tai San to find out about us. We're just lucky that she has her own magic: she understands the difference between us and Chrisma and her cronies."

Cat and her daughter chatted and crooned over baby Micah for an hour afterwards, thankfully uninterrupted by any "games" in the ward outside. When Micah eventually drifted off to sleep, Aeryn decided she had better take him up to his cot in their side ward and perhaps even get some sleep herself. Left alone, Cat tackled their unwilling eavesdropper.

_"You heard then?"_

_"When were you going to tell me I had a niece?"_

_"When you found out, or if there ever was a good time to tell you."_

_"And now I have a great nephew? You're making me feel old!"_


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

In the new neonatal ward, Jay hovered over the hurriedly put together incubators which held his two new daughters. They were so small, but they were fighters, like there mother. They would survive. He knew it. Jay was so engrossed in watching his new family that he didn't notice Patch walk up beside him until he put a hand on his shoulder.

"Congratulations, Jay," Patch said, warmly, "they seem strong. They have as good a chance as we can give them."

"I know," Jay replied, "Thanks, Patch."

In her room in the nearby maternity ward, Ebony lay sleeping off the effects of her operation. As she lay there, in her hospital bed, a red stain spread outwards across the no longer clean white sheets above and below her.

--  


Jetta raised her head to look at the three young women standing before her. Chrisma folded her arms across her chest and smiled as one of the other two women stepped forward and began drawing in chalk on the floor around Jetta's chair. When she had finished, she stepped back to admire her work. Although she could not see all of it, Jetta could see enough to guess that she was in the centre of a five pointed star, the points of which were bounded by a circle.

"That's the Mall Rat's amulet," she muttered.

"Huh!" Chrisma sneered, "It's a lot more than that! They never even knew what they're little amulet symbolised!"

"Enlighten me!" Jetta hissed.

"Why bother? You won't be able to do anything with the information," Chrisma paused to laugh, "Well, not after we're finished here!"

"We're ready here, sister," one of the other women said.

Chrisma straightened herself and took up her position at a point on the circle in front of Jetta. The three women held out their arms straight to either side, as if reaching for each other's hands but just too far apart to be able to touch. They started chanting something in a language Jetta did not recognise. Edging her chair forward, she began rubbing out the chalk lines with her boot.

"Stop her!" cried one of the other women.

Moving swiftly, Chrisma punched Jetta first in the stomach, causing her to gasp, then in the face, knocking her out.

In the cafe of the mall, Jack gasped and doubled over, clutching his side, letting the glass of water he had been holding crash to the floor. As Amber, Trudy, Tai San and Cloe rushed to his side, Jack fell to the floor, unconscious. Salene hovered further behind, holding Zac in her arms, with Brady by her side.

"Lex!" Tai San shouted, "Lex!"

Back in the warehouse, Chrisma and her two companions began their ritual once again. They chanted in the strange language until a blue light appeared in each of their hands. The light stretched into a shaft to join their hands, completing their circle around Jetta. All three women brought their hands in to face the unconscious Jetta. The light still travelled between the adjacent hands until each arm was extended straight towards Jetta, at which point three shafts leapt forward from each band of light to meet at and encircle Jetta's head. The three witches spoke in unison and the light receded from them to Jetta, then faded, seemingly, into her skull. The witches stamped on the floor three times, and the candles that had been placed at the five points of the star flickered out.

"It is done," one witch said.

"Is the vial safe?" Chrisma asked.

"It is hidden safely," replied the third witch, "As long as it remains so, the girl will remain under our command."

"Excellent," Chrisma smiled.

In the cafe, Jack woke up with a start.

"Mate," Lex said, gently, "Are you okay?"

"I-It's gone!" Jack answered.

"What's gone?" Lex asked, puzzled.

"Th-the pain. I had a pain in my side. Like I'd been hit. Th-then another one in my face. Then everything went black. But now there's no pain. Nothing. I-I don't even feel ill anymore."

"_Cat," _Lex called to his sister, mentally,_ "Something's not right here."_

In the background Salene frowned, wondering who Lex was talking to.

--  


Pride sat in the room he had shared with Salene. He held a photo of the two of them in his hands, letting his frustrated tears fall freely onto the glass covering. It showed them in happier times, only a little while after Salene had found our she was pregnant. It had been taken the same day they had told everyone. It had been the happiest day of his life. He had felt so proud. So excited. He was going to be a father. That dream was gone now. His baby was dead. The woman he loved, the woman who would have been the mother of his child, had it lived, had no idea who he was.

He had gone out searching for Jetta, hoping that would take his mind off his own troubles, but it hadn't. Eventually, Hawk had told him to go: he was no good to them as he was and he was only slowing them down. He wouldn't have gone if it had been Ryan that had said it, but coming from Hawk it was different. He had known the young man in the Eco's and they had hunted together many times. He knew Hawk was right.

Pride looked up, through tear-blurred eyes, to see someone hobble into the room. It was Helena. She came over and sat beside him.

"Don't give up on her, Pride," Helena said, softly, "Tai San says it's only temporary. Her memory will come back. Just give her time."

"I know," the former Eco sighed, "But it's so hard! I love her. And I need her right now. Our baby died! And I don't even have the woman I love to grieve with! She doesn't know me! She doesn't know that it was our baby that died!"

"But she will. Where there's life there's hope, right?"

Pride nodded, tearfully.


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Salene sat in the café, mulling over what she had heard Lex say, when she heard a reply that puzzled her even more.

"_It must mean that they've completed the spell. It's too late to try and find Jetta now: she'll find us. If I'm right, they'll send her straight back to us. All that we can do is remember that, unwilling as she is, she is still a spy for a powerful enemy. Once she returns, watch her like a hawk: she has to make contact with them somehow to report back, although she may not know she is doing it. Once we know haw they have her making contact, we can try and stop them that way. See if you can find out from Jack exactly what was said and done: there are many control spells out there. We need to know which one was used to have a decent chance of breaking it. If we can't find that out, our only hope is Jack himself."_

"_But what if he can't break it, sis? Have we lost her forever?"_

"_Again, it depends, Lex. It all depends on what spell was used."_

Sal blinked in confusion as the voices died away. Lex had never had a sister! She had to be going crazy, hearing voices in her head like this! She shivered in fear: going crazy wasn't a wonderful option in a world like this! She had to find Pride: he would know what was going on. Sal stopped. Pride? Who was Pride? Why did she have this inexplicable feeling that seeing him would make her feel better?

Trudy broke Salene's train of thought by coming over and asking if she was okay. She had noticed Sal sit down and wondered if the two children were a bit too much for her just now. Sal, still in a slight daze, nodded and excused herself, saying she was feeling a little tired and handing the children to Trudy.

Sal walked down the corridor to hers and Pride's room. There it was again, she thought: that name. Pride. Saying the word aloud, Sal stopped walking and tried to put a face to the name. All she could see, in her minds eye, was a pair of soft green eyes and longish, dark hair. She shrugged and continued walking to her room, only to see Ryan standing a little distance from the door, looking inside. She walked up to him and looked into the room. She saw a dark haired man with his face buried in the shoulder of a young girl with a wooden leg. It looked like the man was crying.

"Pride!" Salene breathed, making Ryan jump.

"S-Sal! You remember!" Ryan whispered in amazement.

"Not really," Sal replied, "Not everything."

"But you know Pride?"

"Yes," Sal looked more closely at the girl with Pride, then turned back to Ryan, "Who is she? I don't know her."

"That's Helena. She escaped from the Chosen mines with me, then we got captured by the Technos. We got separated after that. Zed found her in the woods. Her leg was badly damaged and Cat had to amputate it. She's alright now though," Ryan smiled, proudly, "I made her a new one. It's not as good as the ones you could get before the virus, but it does the job. She's a brave girl."

Salene watched the look on his face and smiled.

"You love her!"

"What? No, Sal, don't be silly, you're just confused."

"No, I'm not, Ryan. Open your eyes! You used to give me that look. I might have forgotten a lot of things, but I haven't forgotten that! You love her!"

"Um. Ah."

Salene laughed and walked on, into her room. She hovered in the doorway a little, then stepped forward and placed a gentle hand on the weeping man's shoulder.

"Pride?"

--

Helena hobbled over to Ryan as Pride wrapped Salene in his arms and sobbed tears of relief into her shoulders.

"Th-that was a nice thing you did," Ryan stammered as Helena joined him outside the couple's door.

"I just listened to someone when they needed me to," she replied, "It's nothing huge."

"It is to Pride."

There were a few moments of awkward silence as the two of them made eye contact, then Helena looked away. She made her way round to the fountain, pausing once she got there to sit and stretch her good leg: it had become stiff whilst she sat on the bed listening to Pride. Ryan caught up with her and sat down beside her.

"Lena…"

Helena looked up at the sound of her nickname. Ryan faltered when her eyes met his and looked away.

"What is it, Ryan?" Helena asked, softly.

"I…" Ryan looked back up to meet her gaze again: she had to know he meant this, "It's just… I meant…" he sighed, looked away, gathered his courage, then looked back, "I love you. With all my heart."

Helena's eyes searched his own for a moment, then she smiled. She lifted her hand to his face, as if checking that he was real, then reached up and kissed him, softly, on the lips. Ryan returned her kiss, gently, not daring to move for fear that the moment might end.

--

Out by the edge of the city, in an alley near a deserted warehouse, two women dumped the prostrate form of a blue-haired girl on the ground. There was a cut across the girls face and a bruise forming on her cheek beside it.

"Will it be enough?" asked a young woman, hidden in the shadow of the warehouse doorway.

"Yes, even with that geek taken into consideration," Chrisma replied, watching the other two women walk back to the doorway, "Your information there was very helpful: it told us we needed a more powerful enchantment than the one we originally planned on using."

--

Patch had just one more stop on his rounds: Ebony. He had left her until last in case Jay wanted to spend some time with his wife, but spotted him standing in the same place, hovering over his daughters' incubators, as he had been when Patch had begun his rounds! Patch hurried on, past the incubators to the next room. There were a few beds in the new postnatal ward, but Ebony was, currently, their only inhabitant.

As soon as he entered the room, Patch could tell there was something wrong: the large red stain seeping through the bedclothes was far too obvious a clue to miss. Leaning back out into the corridor, he yelled for the nurses. As the few surround people came running, passing the call back through the hospital, Patch saw Jay look round the door of the neonatal ward. Their eyes locked and Patch saw Jay's skin pale beneath his tan. The fear in the man's eyes was vastly apparent as he dashed along the corridor to Patch's side.

"No, Jay," Patch told the ex-general, "You have to give us room to work. We'll do our best for her."


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20

Salene spent a few joyful hours with Pride, in their room, before someone came looking for her. Ryan had managed to get across the message that she had recovered part of her memory and was alone with Pride, so no-one had even considered bothering them for quite a while. When Cloe knocked on the doorframe She was sitting on the edge of the bed, with Pride beside her, going through photos from their time together. Hand in hand, Salene and Pride followed Cloe up to the café. Ryan and Helena were sitting hand in hand in a corner. Salene smiled when she saw them and Ryan smiled back gratefully. There were a number of other people gathered in the room: Amber and Sasha, with Baby Bray; Trudy and an unhappy Brady; a young man who looked painfully shy, but smiled brightly when Cloe walked over to him; a young woman with short, white hair and a silver line running, vertically, through her right eye; a slightly older man with black, spiky hair that had bright blue tips to match his shirt and a Chinese symbol on his right cheek; and lastly Lex, standing at the head of the table like an army general.

"Salene," Lex began, smiling, "Come and sit down. There's a lot we need to fill you in on."

Salene eyed Lex suspiciously, but sat down all the same.

"Wh-what's going on?" Pride asked, putting a protective hand on Salene's shoulder.

"I-it's all right Pride. I'm sure this isn't anything to do with me," Salene said, placing her hand on top of Pride's before turning back to Lex, "Is Jack all right?"

"Tai San's with him just now," Lex replied, "He's sleeping soundly. The nightmares seem to have stopped, at least."

"Is that good or bad?" Salene asked, causing a few murmurs and frowns around the table.

"Jack should be fine... Well, physically fine, anyway," Lex answered, looking slightly confused.

"And has Jetta come back yet?"

"We still haven't found her" Trudy cut in, shaking her head wearily.

"Wait, how do you know about Jetta, Sal?" Amber asked, suddenly, "Do you remember her?"

"No, I just overheard people... talking," Sal replied, shaking her head and then looking up to Lex as she said the last word.

Lex frowned.

"_Cat, can she hear us?"_ he asked his sister, mentally.

"Who's Cat?" Salene asked.

Lex jumped. His eyes widened.

"_That would be yes then!"_ came the reply.

As Lex realised that he had been too long in answering, Trudy decided to answer for him.

"She's a girl Lex and Tai San brought back with them some time ago. She looked after you when you... when you were ill."

"I was ill?"

"Yes," Trudy said slowly, "You were very ill for a while."

"And that's how I lost my memory?"

"Yes."

Salene noted the hesitation in Trudy's voice.

"What? What aren't you telling me?"

"A lot," Amber cut in, "but you have to remember it for yourself Sal, that's why."

Salene shifted her gaze from Trudy to Amber and then to Lex, then nodded and looked down. A moment or two later, she looked up at Lex again.

"So why are we here?"

"First of all," Lex began, straightening and drawing his brows together, "Josh has come here with both good news and bad news. The good news is that Paul and Zed are back with more players for the hospital. One of them is Patsy. She's still out of it and she will be for some time, but Patch says he's hopeful that she'll make a full recovery."

"And the bad news?" Pride asked, still standing with his hand on Salene's shoulder.

"Well, there's more good news first," Lex began, "We have three new additions to the tribe."

"At least that would explain why I don't recognise some people here!" Salene laughed.

"Oh, no, Sal, sorry, I'll introduce you later. I meant really new additions. Last night, although some of you have already heard this, Aeryn had a little boy: Micah."

There was a chorus of aws and cheers.

"And this morning, Ebony gave birth to twin girls."

There were still some aws, but Salene, Trudy and Amber looked from one another then back to Lex with worried faces.

"Which brings me on to the bad news," Lex said, quietly, the room returning to a hush as everyone noted the look on his face, "I'm afraid there were some complications when Ebony went into labour and she had to have an operation: a caesarian. She survived the operation and was moved to a side ward close to her daughters but later suffered a massive haemorrhage. She lost a lot of blood before anyone was able to do anything. I'm afraid she didn't survive."

There was a chorus of tearful and shocked gasps. Ebony had never been the best loved member of the Mall Rats, but she was a strong woman. No-one could understand how someone so strong, someone who had always been such a fighter, could have slipped away so easily. But that was Ebony: at war with the world. She had fought to bring her daughters into the world and she had won; but in return, nature had claimed another life: her own.

Lex looked down. He was thinking of Siva. He could stand here and tell everyone in his tribe about Ebony but the one person he wanted to be there for when they found out was Siva. He didn't know where she was or if she was even alive: there was no way he knew of to get a message back to her that her sister, her little sister, whom she had only just got to know again, was dead. He sighed and shook his head, then turned and left the room.

Gradually, the café cleared of people until only Pride and Salene were left. Salene was holding Pride's hand as he sat in the seat previously occupied by Trudy and her daughter.

"Are you okay?" Pride asked, gently, brushing her scarlet hair away from her face as he spoke.

"Yeah," Salene looked up and smiled the smile she used when she was trying to convince herself as much as anyone else, but her eyes gave her away.

Pride smiled and kissed her forehead.

"You know, if there's one thing that life in the Eco tribe taught me, it's that death is nothing to be feared. It's just another part of living. The last part, yes, but a part of it all the same. We should be happy that Ebony had the chance to pass on the gift of life to two new beings."

Salene noticed his voice crack at certain points.

"What's wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

"You say all that, trying to make me feel better, but it sounds like you were trying to... well... convince yourself too. Why?"

"Well..." Pride's brow furrowed as he tried to think up a good answer, "I knew Ebony too."

"But you guys hated each other!"

"True," Pride shrugged.

"So what made you say it like that?"

"I guess I was just thinking of how close I came to losing you," Pride replied; it wasn't the entire truth, but it wasn't exactly a lie either.

Salene smiled and looked down. After a few moments of silence, she got up.

"I have to find Lex. I want a word with him about something."

"Okay," Pride acquiesced, standing up, "I'll help you find him."

"No, it's okay," she answered hurriedly, "I'll be fine. Besides, you need to go tidy your room if you want me sharing it tonight!"

She kissed him on the cheek then hurried out of the room and along a corridor to Lex's room. He wasn't there. She tried Tai San's room next, but he wasn't there either. At last she remembered that he had said Tai San was watched over Jack and headed to Jack's room. She found them both there, conversing quietly while Jack lay sleeping.

"Lex?" Salene said, half whispering for fear of disturbing Jack.

"Sal!" Lex said, standing up and turning round quickly.

"Come in Salene," Tai San whispered, offering Salene a seat beside them, "Lex was telling me about the meeting. I know you must have a lot of questions."

Salene frowned.

"There's a lot to explain, Sal," Lex added, pulling the chair back a bit for her to sit down.

Salene sat down quietly, folded her hands in her lap, stared at them for a while, trying to formulate her questions in her mind, then looked up to Lex.

"I heard you talking to someone," she began, "Someone called Cat. I'm sure I heard you, but... there was no-one there, apart from me, and yet I heard her reply to you!"

"You're not going mad," Lex said quickly, "You did hear me talking to Cat."

"But she wasn't there! And you called her 'sis'!"

"I know. She is my sister. I didn't know I had one until a while after we found her, but she is my sister. She didn't recognise me either."

"But she wasn't there!" Salene's voice grew more agitated.

"That's the more difficult bit to explain."

"I remember hearing the two of you talking about how magic can only trick the mind not the heart. Are you going to tell me that's what all this is? Magic?"

"Something like that, yes," Lex shrugged: Salene seemed to have worked out all of this for herself, all he had to do were put her right on the bits she got wrong.

"And you and your newfound sister are what? Witches?"

"Technically, I'm a warlock or a wizard or something I believe."

"And you know all about this?" Salene turned to Tai San.

"I do," Tai San replied, calmly, "and yes, I have some abilities of my own, but nothing like the power which runs in Lex's family."

"Like what?" Salene sat back a little.

"My premonitions for one thing. I always knew when I had a premonition that that was what it was and that it was real, as with Eagle Mountain, but I never knew more than that. I only had premonitions occasionally and when I was either asleep or meditating. With Cat's help, I am learning how to hone my skills so that I can control them."

Salene nodded. Tai San's premonitions were at least a starting point. She was used to them. They used to freak her out, at first. Especially when Tai San announced that the antidote was at Eagle Mountain while Jack came up with the exact same answer. The thought brought Jack back to her mind. She glanced across at him, sleeping peacefully in the bed.

"Will he be okay?" she asked, without moving her gaze from the sleeping Jack.

"Physically, yes," Lex replied.

"But what about not physically?" Salene met Lex's gaze, "You're worried. I heard you telling Cat about what happened in the café. What does it mean? What's going on? I know you know why he was having those dreams!"

Lex sighed and looked away. Tai San put a hand on his arm and murmured something Salene couldn't make out. Lex nodded and turned back to Salene.

"Sal, listen to me. What I am going to tell you isn't general knowledge: Tai San, myself, Cat and possibly Aeryn are the only people that know about this. Sometimes, if you're lucky enough, you meet someone who is your soulmate. Now you might think you know what that word means, but you're wrong: there's a heck of a lot that you don't know about it. When I talk about soulmates, I mean literally: two people meet and their souls are joined, inseparable. There's a link that forms almost immediately, sometimes it's already there, and when one of those two people are in trouble, the other one knows it. It doesn't always show. You don't always know about it, but it is there. Maybe just as a niggling doubt that everything is fine and if you were to rush home now you would only get told off for being silly and worrying too much. Sometimes, however, when it's needed, it shows. It can show itself so much that the other person actually feels their soulmate's pain: they can become as one person. It can happen at any time, whether they are awake or asleep. Sometimes others can see it, like with Jack, and other times they can't."

"So this Jetta is Jack's soulmate?"

"So it seems."

"Funny, I always thought it would be Ellie!"

"If it had been, she wouldn't have cheated on him. Not the way she did. Maybe she might have when he was gone and she didn't know if she would ever see him again, but not after he came back. No way."

"And so this Jetta's in trouble?"

"She's disappeared. No-one knows exactly when or how. She works up at the hospital, but she's been doing double shifts and Patch told her to take some time off. No-one seems to know where she's been going during that time."

"What about Jack?"

"He's been busy working on an important project for us."

"Does he know what's going on?"

"No," Lex's negative was simply and straightforward.

"What sort of trouble is she in? I heard you say something about a spell."

"We think, from what Jack has told us, that she was taken by a coven: three witches, joined together to make them stronger. We hoped to find her before they had time to cast the spell, but we think now that we're too late for that."

"So, what? Is Jetta dead?"

"Not exactly. Cat thinks they were doing a control spell so they at least want her alive for something, possibly, probably, to infiltrate us and spy for them. When they cast the spell, they stopped, perhaps completely severed, Jack and Jetta's connection. We don't know how that will affect either one of them. It won't kill them. It won't do them any physical harm. It might play havoc, however, with who they are: without the link to each other, it'll be like a part of them is missing."

Salene bit her lip, then asked:

"So why could I hear you then? I presume I was the only one in the café who could."

"You, Brady and Baby Bray, which is why the kids have taken a sudden dislike to me and Cat. They hear me because they listen with their hearts, not their minds. They are too young for their minds to butt in and say "that's not possible". I'm not too sure about you, but I'd guess it must be something similar: without your memory, you are relying on your heart to tell you what is true and what isn't and so you hear us. The talent may go when your memory comes back or, as you now know something of what's really going on, it might not. You may even have some ability yourself if it stays. Everyone does, they just don't believe it is there. Things like that disappear if you don't believe in them."

She nodded and stood up.

"I'd better go find Pride: he'll be worried."

"Remember, you can't even tell him."

"I won't," Salene turned to go, then paused, "One more thing. When you were talking about soulmates and the link they form, what did you mean when you said "if it wasn't there already"?"

"Ah," Lex replied, frowning, "perhaps we'd better discuss that one when you've got more time to spare. Much more time!"


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter 21

"No... No... No... " Jay stared straight ahead, repeating his denial over and over again, his body rocking gently as he sat in the corner of the side ward.

"How long has he been like this?" Tai San asked Patch as they observed the stricken young man from the doorway.

"Ever since we told him," the young doctor pushed his spectacles up on his nose and shrugged, "He won't eat, won't drink... Won't even see his daughters."

"I wish that I knew him better. Everything has been so busy since Lex became City Leader that I never really had time to get to know him while Ebony was still with us."

"Maybe it's better that you don't know him as well as most. We all got to know him as the Techno General: cool, calm, strong, decisive. You met him after all that was gone and he was just Jay: nice guy, might be a good leader, trustworthy and willing to take on Ebony!"

"And in a coma for most of the first year in which I knew him!"

_--_

"Who have you left with Jack?" Cat asked as Lex cradled baby Micah in his arms.

"Hm? Oh. Sal. She knows: she could hear us clearly. I've explained the situation with Jetta to her and she knows what to look out for. She'll let us know if anything happens. Pride seems happy enough with the explanation that she would rather be looking after someone else for a change rather than everyone looking after her. She's remembered him, by the way. Did I tell you?"

"No, but it doesn't surprise me. Are you sure she will be able to cope if anything goes drastically wrong?"

"She's better prepared than anyone else in the mall and Tai San was needed here. Plus I wanted to see this chap. It's not everyday you find out you're a great-uncle at the age of 20!"

"Yes, well..." Cat looked down and Aeryn smiled.

"So while we're all here, together," Lex continued, pulling faces at the tiny child in his arms as he spoke, "Why don't you tell me exactly how I ended up with a niece only one year younger than myself?"

Cat and Aeryn looked at each other and Aeryn shrugged.

"Not long after you were born," Cat began, "I got myself in a bit of trouble at uni. I ended up pregnant and our parents were furious! The let me have the baby, but then give it up for adoption as soon as it was born. When Aeryn was born, I wasn't even allowed to see her. Her life and her name were the only things I was allowed to give my own daughter! It was after that that I started using the skills I had learnt amongst the old books: I used fire-scrying to see my daughter and watch her grow; I could watch her new family feed her and bathe her and take her out to show her off to their friends. I was half mad with jealousy and I used my scrying skills more and more. As I grew more focussed, I became better and better. Eventually, I could widen the view and I see where these people, who had my daughter, lived. It was a nice, quiet suburb: a pretty house with a tidy front lawn and a large garden. They were near the beach, but they were over the other side of the island.

I was a medical student and only had the money our parents gave me to survive on. We weren't a rich family, but our parents had always said that we were their responsibility until we had finished all our schooling and they supported me entirely through university. I didn't even have a Saturday job! I had spent much of my savings on the course I was doing and other necessities and had little money of my own left. Enough to take me to the other side of the island, then, hopefully support me and my baby for a while anyway. I looked for a way to save money and I found the spell: _Aevum Liberatio_. It would stop time for me: I didn't have to worry about eating, sleeping, anything! I could put all my money into taking care of my daughter.

I thought no further ahead than how to get my daughter back and get her away from those people. I cast the spell as best I could and was amazed to find it had worked exactly as planned. I packed up my old camping gear and some other useful things, as well as all my magical instruments and a few choice books. Then, one night, as you so clearly remember, I left, while our parents were out and you were asleep upstairs. I caught a late bus halfway across the island, then walked or hitched the rest of the way.

It took me a whole week to find my daughter and in that time I didn't eat or sleep at all. Once I found her, I had to wait for a good time to take her. I couldn't risk being caught and taken home without her. I used my scrying abilities to watch Aeryn and the couple looking after her and, about a week after I arrived, I heard the woman on the phone: her usual baby-sitter had let her down and she was ordering a replacement from an agency. It was the perfect chance. I waited for half an hour, then I went down and knocked on the door. I made some excuse about allowing too much time for traffic and thus turning up being early, then they left me with my daughter and went out. By the time the real baby-sitter arrived, I was gone. I left a note saying I was Aeryn's mother and I had taken her, along with my reasons for doing so and an apology for any pain I may have caused. I never looked back to find out what they thought of the note.

Perhaps I should have done. Or maybe I should have looked a little further ahead. With everyone looking out for me, I soon found that there was nowhere to run. I could either keep my daughter with me and be caught and taken to prison, or give her up and hide in the mountains. With no need for food and water, or sleep, I could survive indefinitely. So, I gave her up. Aeryn was returned to the couple looking after her, in whose family crypt we buried my late son-in-law, and I remained hidden, spending all my time studying magic and honing my skills.

As the years passed, Aeryn became, in looks, more like my sister than my daughter. When it was time for her to go to high school, her foster-parents found her a place in a boarding school in the city. I managed to make contact with her when she started dabbling in magic herself and eventually we found a way to meet. Blood will out, Lex. My daughter barely knew me, yet she followed the same path as I and, through he use of her powers, found me and knew me. Meetings, however, became gradually more difficult and Aeryn and I agreed that we could no longer continue with both the magic I was teaching her and contact in any other way. The agreement was that I would leave the city, never to return, and, when Aeryn's time in the school was finished, she would come and find me. As it happened, the virus hit before Aeryn finished her schooling and everything changed. She did come looking for me but, as you know, she has no way of contacting me or looking for me and so could not find me. I could see her, when I was scrying, but never did catch up with her until now. The rest you know."

"You _stole_ Aeryn!" Lex exclaimed in disbelief.

"Well, what would you have done: she was _my_ daughter!"

"Mum only did what she thought was right at the time!" Aeryn interjected, getting up to take Micah from his great-uncle's arms, "Besides, what does that matter now?"

"I guess it doesn't," Lex conceded, "but that doesn't mean Tai San's not gonna want to know!"

"We can tell her once she's finished with Jay, or at least stops for a break," Cat stood up and walked over to the desk, picking up a book once she got there, "Right now we need to concentrate on finding a way to bring Jetta back to normality."

"Are you sure she'll find her way back okay?" Aeryn asked, her brow creasing into worry lines.

"Oh yes," Cat nodded, confidently, "the spell would be designed to do just that. It's what happens after she returns to the mall that is less predictable. Besides, her captors will be taking care to protect their investment and it wouldn't be a good idea to let them know we know what they're up to."

_--_

Jetta stumbled, slowly, through the city. Her face hurt and her head was pounding. Her limbs were stiff and she felt as if she hadn't moved in weeks. The only thing she could think about was getting back to the mall and finding out what was going on.

_--_

Zed held one of the players steady while Angie cleaned a jagged gash in the player's forehead: a blow gained during one of the "games". As he concentrated on holding his charge steady, he looked across the room to where Paul sat by his sister's bedside. Jon walked over to his deaf friend and, as Zed watched, placed a hand on Paul's shoulder, drawing his attention away from Patsy, and made a few signs with his hands. Zed could barely make the signs out, but, from the time he had spent in the search party with Paul, he guessed that Jon was asking him if he wanted something to drink. Paul nodded and Jon disappeared, reappearing a few moments later with a glass of water. Zed smiled: his supposition had been right.

When the worst of this is over, Zed thought, and all the searchers are home, it would be useful to learn more of Paul's signs. The young man had been a good source of knowledge and information during their previous journey, but without a pen and paper, communication would have been very difficult, if not impossible!

The player struggled again, taking Zed's attention back to his current task. It was a young girl of about 6. She looked familiar, but Zed couldn't match a name to the pale face before him. Once she was well again, maybe, then she would be able to tell him herself who she was.


	22. Chapter 22

Chapter 22

Cloe sat in the dust hotel basement, a headset on her head once again. She had dreaded putting the vile thing back on, remembering what had happened to her the last time she had done so, but curiosity had eventually overcome fear. She stood in the virtual world Jack had created for the victims of Operation Dormouse, looking at her surroundings in awe. Tall trees towered over Cloe, their high branches meeting in a seamless and roof-like canopy allowing dappled green light to filter through the leaves to the leaf strewn forest floor. Moss covered rocks and boulders were scattered around like throw-cushions and patches of ferns and wildflowers grew where the light allowed. An intensity of green growth directed her attention to the banks of a broad, but shallow, stream, its bubbling water sparkling like a river of diamonds. Jack had certainly put in a lot of work.

"He didn't do it all himself, you know," a familiar voice called.

Cloe wanted to turn round, she wanted it with all her heart, but she found herself frozen. Tears crept into her eyes and stomach felt as though it had been punched. She choked back a sob as familiar arms slid around her waist and familiar lips kissed her cheek. He was really here.

_--_

Salene shook herself awake. She mustn't fall asleep. Not now. Not while she was the only one here. She looked over at Jack. He still lay there, motionless. His face was pale and he hadn't moved a muscle since, according to Lex, the bond between him and Jetta had been cut. Leaning forward, Salene pressed the back of her hand against Jack's forehead. It was cold. She suddenly looked worried and moved her hand to her friend's chest, but relaxed again when she was sure that his heart was still beating. His lips were dry though. She took the sponge from the bowl of water nearby, wrung it out and dabbed his lips with it as Tai San had directed. If it only got a minuscule amount of water into him, it was better than nothing, but she had to be careful not to kill him with kindness and drown him.

As Salene turned to replace the sponge, she heard a movement from the bed. She turned, half expecting to find something had fallen from the wall or table. Instead, she saw that Jack's head had moved to one side.

"Jack?" Salene asked, her voice shaking.

As much as she wanted her old friend to wake up, she was terrified of what change may have come over him if, or when, he should do so. Perhaps it had just been a movement caused by her dampening his lips with the sponge, she thought. Perhaps it was nothing.

Sitting back down to her lonely vigil, Salene tried to convince herself that nothing was going to happen until Lex and Tai San returned, whenever that may be. As she watched though, she was sure she saw Jack's brow crease and un-crease. Just a trick of the light maybe. She was tired, after all. Then his eyes started to open. He blinked a few times in the light, then began to look around. Salene was frozen. She couldn't move; she couldn't even speak.

"Sal?"

Jack's eyes slowly focussed on his red-haired companion.

"S-Sal? You okay?"

_--_

"Jay?" Tai San said, softly.

Kneeling before the stricken young man, she grasped both of his hands in hers and pulled them down from his head to his lap. Still rocking back and forth, Jay looked up with red rimmed eyes. Blinking back tears, he tried to focus his gaze on Tai San.

"She's gone," he said, plaintively, tears beginning to form once more.

"I know."

"I've lost her."

"No, Jay, you'll never lose her. Not now."

"I'll never get her back."

"She's right here, Jay: in her daughters, _your_ daughters; in your memories and our memories. She always will be."

"She was so strong. Everything life threw at her, she survived. Everything. Except this."

"Jay listen to me: Ebony was, eventually, a part of our tribe, the Mall rats. A tribe whose very existence is inspired by their abode: the Phoenix Mall. Just like the legendary phoenix, we built our new world from the ashes of the old: one life ends, another one starts. This is the way it has always been and will ever be. And, just like the phoenix, from the end of Ebony's life, here with us, we see the beginning of two new ones. Two lives that she fought, with every fibre of her body, to bring into this world. Honour her memory in bringing up those children. Teach them who their mother was, that they may never forget her."

_--_

"Something's wrong!" Lex exclaimed, suddenly, causing Cat and Aeryn to look up from the books they were studying.

"What is it?" Cat asked walking over to him as Aeryn stood up and took her son out of his great-uncle's arms.

"I don't know... Do you think it's important?"

"If you felt it, it must be."

"Is it Tai San?" Aeryn asked, shifting Micah's weight to her other arm.

"I don't know. This has never happened before."

"I'll bet it has," Cat cut in, "you just didn't put as much faith in your feelings then as you do now. Try and clear your mind... Where do you want to go?"

Lex closed his eyes and was silent for a few moments.

"Back to the mall," he finally replied.

"Then it's not Tai San. It must be Jack. I'll come with you."

"I'll find Tai San first and let her know..."

"No, I'll do that," Aeryn offered, "You should hurry."

Lex and Cat hurried out of the office, Cat still carrying the elderly volume she had been reading. When they reached the mall they hurried to Jack's room and found Jack kneeling on the floor next to an unconscious Salene.

"She just passed out," he offered as way of explanation, "I don't think she was expecting me to wake up."

"Sal?" Lex knelt next to the red-haired girl and shook her, "Sal, it's okay, we're here now."

"Lex?" Sal's voice was groggy as she came round.

"It's okay, I'm here."

"Jack woke up."

"Yeah, we noticed. It's okay. He's okay. Everything's fine."

"_Are_ you okay, Jack?" Cat asked, uncertainly: the previously prostrate young man seemed to have made a marvelous recovery, "How do you feel?"

"I-I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?"

"Jack? Mate?" Lex began, turning to face the younger man, "What just happened?"

"Ah, I woke up. I looked over at Sal. She went as white as a sheet and dropped like a stone. Five, ten minutes later, you guys show up. Not much to tell."

"And before that. Before you woke up. What's the last thing you remember?"

"Going... to... bed. Why? That some crime now?"

Lex cast a glance up at Cat, who shrugged and turned to Jack.

"So, Jack, what was happening before you went to bed?"

"What? What is this guys? Lex? Sal? What's going on?" Jack looked at his two friends, then back to Cat, "Who are you anyway?"

Cat sighed and looked down at Lex and Salene's worried faces.

"I'm a healer," she replied eventually, "Like Patch. And you've been ill, Jack. Very ill."

"Firstly," Jack shrugged, "I feel fine and secondly, who's Patch?"

"Jack," Lex cut in, "why don't we get you something to eat and drink, then we can all have a talk. I think there is a lot we need to fill each other in on."

Jack's forehead creased. He considered for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders and replied, cheerfully:

"Okay."

_--_

Amber stood in the small room off the main hallway of the mall. Before her, on a pallet on the table, wrapped in a shroud as if he were an Egyptian mummy, lay Bray's body. Tomorrow, they would carry him to the beach and give him the same farewell as they had his brother so many years ago.

A hand touched Amber's shoulder and she looked round. Sasha stood there, silently reminding her that others wished to say their farewells. Word had spread around the city that the famous Bray was dead and lay in state at the mall. His would be the closest thing to a state funeral the city had ever seen.

And then there was Ebony, Amber reminded herself. She too had left this world for the next. She too would have to be buried soon. Siva would have to be found. It wasn't right that they should bury her last sister without her. It was so odd, she thought, looking back over the years that she and Ebony had fought. Mainly over Bray. Now they were both dead. Dead within days of each other. At last she blotted her eyes and turned to the door. With Sasha's arm around her she walked out of the room and past the waiting queue of mourners.


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter 23

Lex walked away from the small crowd leaving the beach after Ebony's funeral. The pyre, the service, everything, had been done exactly the same way as at Bray's funeral two days earlier, with only the necessary changes to the obituary and the fact that there were, surprisingly, more mourners. Now the crowd was dispersing and Lex hurried to catch up with Jack.

"Jack, mate, wait up," Lex called to the red-haired young man.

"Everything okay with those cameras, Lex?" Jack asked, turning to face the City Leader: Lex had made sure he had been kept busy since he regained consciousness but upgrading the security of the mall, not that it hadn't needed doing anyway.

"Yeah, yeah," Lex assured his friend, placing a hand on his shoulder as he did so, "that wasn't what I wanted to talk to you about though."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, this is something a bit more... well... more delicate, I suppose."

"M-More delicate?"

"Yeah, it's about your memory: there's a few things I've been wondering about."

"Oh, you mean about Patch and Skye and Slade and all the new people in the mall and the hospital?"

"Not quite, although I have a few questions there too."

"Oh, it's okay. I mean, I-I didn't remember them at first, a-and I couldn't have put names to faces and all, but once I saw them I knew I knew them, i-if that... makes sense," Jack frowned as if he'd confused himself, "But what was it you wanted to talk to me about?"

"It's about Ellie," Lex watched Jack's face.

"Ellie?" Jack's frown increased.

"Jack, you've asked a heck of a lot of questions over the past three days, and I think we're all fairly sure something's not right with your memory, but the one person you've never asked about, or the one main person anyway, is Ellie. Why not?"

Jack looked to the ground, his eyes darting back and forth as if searching inside himself for the answer. For such a simple question, it was a surprisingly difficult answer to find. Eventually the painful recollection came back to him and he felt his face grow hot.

"Because she's dead," he said, quietly.

Lex could see the tears threatening to burst forth, but he had to know more.

"How do you know?"

"I don't know. I just do. And it hurts! Wh-why does it hurt so much? Why, Lex?" Jack looked up at his friend, "You know what happened, don't you?"

For a moment, Jack's accusatory rhetoric made Lex panic but, as he realised the young man had only referred to his former girlfriend's death, not his own condition and lack of memory, he relaxed.

"Look inside, mate," Lex said softly, "try to remember on your own."

_--_

Jay looked down at his daughters. He had gone straight from the funeral to the hospital without thinking, as if it were his home. It may as well have been, for he had barely left the hospital building since he had found out Ebony was in labour. He certainly hadn't been back to the mall. How could he go back there, or back to the hotel, when both places he used to call home were filled with so many memories and ghosts of her.

Tai San's words played over and over in his mind. They had come back to him during the funeral, when the flames began to take over the pyre, and he had almost expected to see her rise again from her own ashes, just like a phoenix. But that wasn't what Tai San had meant: she had meant that Ebony lived on in her daughters. The two, tiny, twin girls lay in their makeshift incubators next to one another. Although they were twins, the difference between them was striking. It seemed that all of Jay's fair skin and hair, as well as Ebony's piercing grey eyes, had gone into one sister, while Ebony's darker skin and hair, with Jay's dark brown eyes, had gone into the other. Just like chalk and cheese, Jay thought, or ebony and ivory. That was it, he thought, smiling suddenly as an epiphany struck him, that was their names: Ebony and Ivory.

_--_

"You shouldn't be here so much," Ved told Cloe as they lay on a grassy bank, watching the stars, "You're spending too much time here. It's not healthy. Trust me: I know!"

"What? I thought you liked having me here?" Cloe frowned, raising herself up onto her elbows.

"I do. It's just: this isn't the real world, Clo. I'm not part of the real world any more."

"You seem real enough to me. You're just trapped in surroundings that aren't."

"Surroundings that will eventually trap you too if you spend too much time here!"

Cloe looked at her feet. She had been thinking about this for a long time and maybe now was the perfect time to broach the subject.

"Maybe I want to be trapped here," she said, adding quietly: "With you."

"No. Cloe, you don't belong here. You have to start facing up to it, Clo: I'm dead. The only reason I'm in here is because I'm dead."

"You weren't dead when we took that headset off you. You died later."

"My body did. The rest of me was already dead. Already stuck in here. You still have a life to lead, Clo. You can't join me."

"But I want to," Cloe wailed, "I love you, Ved. I will always love you!"

"I know. And I'll always love you. Just like Jay will always love Ebony. But he'll be able to move on, in time, and love someone else too. Just like you have to."

_--_

Skye had taken a long route back to the mall, walking part-way to the farm with Slade as he headed up to help Ryan with the new house. Very little had changed in her appearance since she had joined the Mall Rats, but her white hair was now cut into a rounded bob, reminiscent of May's in earlier years, with silver extensions hanging down around her neck. Hearing a noise behind her, she turned quickly, silver extensions swinging with the motion, but saw no-one. Not wholly satisfied with the empty alley behind her, she ducked behind some piles of boxes and waited.

As she waited, a familiar, blue-haired figure became visible at the far end of the alley. At first, Skye thought it was a trap: that the dishevelled girl would be followed by a group of thugs ready to pounce on the first person that welcomed her; but then she realised that none of the Mall Rats would have good reason to come this was and her own reason for being here was more spur of the moment than planned. Stepping out from her hiding place, she took a few tentative steps towards the ragged figure. The girl saw her and stopped.

"Skye?"

"Jetta!" Skye cried, rushing forward to catch the nurse as she collapsed in a heap.

_--_

"Whoever she is," Aeryn was saying, "I'm sure she'll be fine here without us. The 'games' seem to have stopped and Patch said he would let us know if she woke up."

"I know," Zed replied, sighing in frustration, "I just wish I could work out how and why I know her!"

"Give it time. She's not going anywhere in a hurry."

Zed shrugged and turned back to Aeryn. She was cradling her son in her arms and had a bag slung over her back. She had hardly slept in days and bags were forming under her eyes, and she hadn't eaten properly, or regularly, for a while either. She looked haggard and pale, but whenever she looked at her son, Zed thought she looked like the most beautiful creature alive.

"Come on," he said, "Alice will be waiting with the cart."

_--_

May sat down hard on the mossy ground. She was feeling sorry for herself again. She often did these days. They were only a day's journey from the city, but already they had lost over a dozen 'players'. More would die during the night. They had failed them. She had failed them. Just like she had failed her little brother when he bled to death. Just like she had failed her little sister when the Locos took her. She had failed. Just like she always did.


	24. Chapter 24

Chapter 24

When Sky brought Jetta back to the mall, everyone rushed forward to see if she was okay. Everyone, that is, except Jack: he hung back a little. Lex was the first to notice him.

"Alright, mate?" Lex asked, tentatively.

"Y-yeah... Yeah," Jack replied, as if somewhat dazed, "Just thought I'd give everyone a bit of room. I-I'm just guessing here, but I think they all know the injured girl."

"Yeah, they do," Lex admitted, keeping to himself, for the moment, the fact that Jack knew her too, "Hey, listen, Jack, why don't we go check on how things are going at the hospital? Alice and Aeryn and co. were leaving this morning: heading back up to the farm."

"Won't you be needed here?"

Lex's eyes scanned the room: Amber and Sasha, Tai San, Trudy and Hawk, Salene and Pride, Brady and Angie bustled around Skye and Jetta.

"I think they can cope. There are more players in the hospital though: they might need a couple of able-bodied helpers!"

"Okay," Jack shrugged, "While I'm there I can take a look at Patch's new computer system. He's been having a few problems, he mentioned them to me at Ebony's funeral, but doesn't have the time to straighten them out."

"All the more reason to get out of their way then!"

Clapping a hand on Jack's shoulder, Lex steered him out of the mall before anyone else could notice his reaction, or rather the lack of one, to Jetta.

_--_

Jay turned away from the incubators to find Dee watching him. She was starting to show a slight bump from her own pregnancy. The memory of Ebony in such a state was bittersweet to Jay and his face must have displayed his emotion for Dee advanced towards him and laid a hand upon his arm.

"We'll take good care of them," she assured him, "I'm here all the time now. Go home and get some rest."

"Home?" Jay replied, wearily, "I'm not sure I even know where that is any more!"

"Jay..." Dee started, but Jay cut in and stopped her.

"It's okay," he said, sighing, "I'll head back to the mall."

Leaving Dee to watch over his daughters, Jay dragged himself down the corridor to the main ward. Once there, he wove his way between the busy nurses and helpers, pausing briefly to glance at a young girl lying peacefully in a bed near the main entrance. She looked familiar. A few beds back, Paul glanced up from his sister's side and, catching the deaf young man's eye, Jay looked away. He still felt guilty for all the hurt he'd helped to cause, even after all he'd done to make things right, and it was difficult for him to meet Paul's eyes. But that girl, in that bed by the door, there was something annoyingly familiar about her.

_--_

Alice drew the cart to a halt outside the farm. Hearing the voices of their friends, Tally and Andy came running forth, one from the farmhouse, one from the barn. The other female resident of the farm also hurried out.

"Everything in order?" Alice asked as she climbed down from the cart.

"Everything's fine," Tally responded, vehemently, "Why wouldn't it be?"

"Just asking!" Alice raised her eyebrows and turned to help Aeryn and Micah down, but found that Zed had beaten her to it.

"I was just preparing the midday meal," the other girl added, curtseying to Alice, "I will make more. Then there should be enough to go around."

"O-kay, Lily, we'll be in in a minute," Alice answered steadily.

There was some controversy about Lily's presence at the farm. The girl had been another of Ram's guinea pigs, but one of the first. She had been loaded into a virtual scenario where Ram was the master of a large, Victorian household and her mind had never quite recovered. Having played the part of one of the kitchen maids in the scenario, she was now most comfortable taking on the same kind of role in Alice's farm and, not having the heart to send her away, even though the farm was filled, almost to the brim, with waifs and strays better known to her, Alice had allowed her to remain. The controversy was not that she should or should not have done so, but rather it was over her reasons for letting the girl stay. She was tall and slim, with clear blue eyes and long, straight, blonde hair. In short, she looked remarkably like Ellie. The only way in which Lily differed from Alice's departed sister was by her character: she was timid, deferential and irretrievably stuck in the Victorian idyll Ram had locked her in for almost three years; her dress sense reflected this in its full skirts, long-sleeved blouse and white apron.

_--_

When Jack and Lex arrived at the hospital, Jay was well on his way back to mall and had taken a different route, through the marketplace. As the two young men walked down the middle of the ward, Lex keeping Jack's attention away from Patsy and on the other side of the room, there was a sudden commotion and a number of players arose and began to fight. At first they were only pointing their arms at others, as if holding a gun or laser, but, when they came into contact with anyone, they began punching and fighting with any item that came to hand.

As soon as Patsy arose to join the players, her watchful brother was ready. Carefully, Paul knocked her out, mouthing an apology as he did so, then turned to help his friend Jon with another player. Thanks to Paul's prompt action, which prevented Patsy causing any further injury to herself or others, Lex managed to get Jack through to the far end of the ward without him noticing the presence of his old friend.

As the fighting subsided, Lex led Jack towards the office and held the door open as the younger man walked in. Jack was barely past the door when he collapsed in a heap on the floor and Lex quickly closed and locked the office door.

"What did you do?" Lex asked.

"Nothing much," Cat replied, "he'll just think that he passed out again, when he wakes up, rather than that someone knocked him out!"

"How long before he wakes up?"

"Long enough. I can always knock him out again if needs be."

_--_

The shadowy figure of a girl sat hunched over a bowl in the warehouse. In the flickering candlelight, her eyes looked glazed as they stared into the inky waters of the bowl.

"Well," snapped a voice, "has she returned to them yet?"

"I see her," the girl replied, "surrounded by friends. There is a statue there: a phoenix. They carry her up the stairs behind it."

"That is the mall, definitely," a third voice cut in, "Is Lex there?"

"Who is Lex?"

"Their leader. The city leader, in fact. Is he with them?"

"I know of whom you speak. He is not there, although his wife is."

"That is long enough," a fourth voice reprimanded, "We are still weak from our labours. It would be foolish to overstretch ourselves now."

"So what do we do now, Chrisma?" the third voice asked.

"Now?" Chrisma, the second voice, replied, "Now, we wait."


	25. Chapter 25

Chapter 25

Jack came round slowly. As the dull flickering light of the room swam into focus he made out the features of Lex sitting, cross-legged, on the floor in front of him.

"L-Lex?" Jack stammered, "What's going on?"

"Quite a lot," was the enigmatic reply, "but nothing you need to worry about, Jack. There is a lot you have to know though."

Jack looked around him. He was in a dark room, about the same size as Patch's office, but without the furniture. Behind him sat the young woman he had found out was Cat. Although there were only two other people in the room besides himself, Jack got the distinct feeling that he was sitting in the centre of a circle.

"Don't worry Jack," said Cat as he started to sit up, "we're here to help, not to harm. The harm has already been done by others."

"What harm? What are you talking about?" Jack sat up and craned his neck round, not wanting to turn his back on Lex, "Is this to do with my memory?"

"Yes. And a few other things. We've managed to find out a lot already, but there are some things we need you to tell us."

"Like what?"

"Like what is the last thing you remember, clearly, before waking up in the mall?"

"Ummmm, I don't know. A lot of it isn't clear. I mean, it's not like memories - just feelings. Does that make sense?"

"It does to us. Do you remember where you were before the mall?"

"The prison camp. I remember that. With Ellie."

"And then? Do you remember how you got out of the prison camp?"

"No. I get the feeling Ellie wasn't there, a-and something tells me she's dead, but I don't know what... I don't know why..."

Confusion creased Jack's brow and his eyes left Cat's face.

"What's going on? Why am I here? What have you done to me?" Jack cried, turning back to Lex.

"We haven't done anything, mate," Lex said, gently, "We're just trying to fix something someone else has done."

"Listen to me Jack," Cat called his gaze back to her, "There is a lot you must know and not all of it will be easy to understand. Even less of it will be easy to accept. You are a scientist: you work with the laws of physics; you understand only what you can explain in their terms. We work with other laws and you will have to try to put science aside in order to understand them."

"I'll try," Jack replied, transfixed by Cat's gaze.

"First, understand this: the eyes of heart and the eyes of the mind both see and hear in different ways. That is why you know things, yet have no memory of them. Secondly: the laws of physics and of science are not the only laws that rule the turning of the earth; the laws of nature and of magic also hold sway. In everything there is balance: night and day; fire and water; science and magic. You understand only science, as do most people. We, and those who have interfered with your mind, understand magic and how to use it. What they have put wrong, we wish to put right. Will you let us try?"

"Yes."

"I want you to think of Jetta."

"Who?"

"The girl who was brought to the mall when Lex brought you here."

"But I've never seen her..."

"Concentrate. Picture her in your mind. Can you see her now?"

"No, but..."

"Try. It doesn't matter that you didn't see her at the mall. The memory of her is within you. Look with your heart, not you mind. Your mind tells you that you do not know her and have never met her. It is lying to you. Listen to your heart."

"I..." Jack's brow wrinkled; the name did inspire a flicker of memory: a memory of a girl with blue hair...

"You see her?"

"Yes," Jack replied quietly, "but how..."

"Keep looking. The memory is within you. Only you can bring it forth."

"I know her..." Jack murmured, "I know her..."

"How do you know her, Jack?" Cat asked, "What is she to you?"

"Everything..."

"Close your eyes now, Jack. Close your eyes and remember."

Jack closed his eyes, unable to do anything else. Immediately, a flood of memories washed over him like water from a bursting dam. With the memories came pain. He cried out and clutched at his side, then collapsed onto the floor.

"Take him up to a side ward, Lex," Cat said, rising, "Don't leave him: he'll need you there when he wakes."

"What about Jetta?" Lex asked, picking up his friend, "Will this affect her?"

Cat looked as Jack's face for a moment, then shook her head.

"I doubt it. Not immediately anyway. They broke the bond from her end in a way that only Jack himself can fix. Until he is ready to face her, and until he can turn her mind back to him, she will remain in their power. At least he will remember now: that is all that we can do. Hurry, before he wakes. I will clear up here."

Lex turned and left the room. When he reached the ward, there were few people about and none between him and the door to one of the side wards. He slipped over to the door and let himself in, then laid Jack down on the empty bed. It hadn't been made, but that didn't matter: they shouldn't be there too long. Walking back to the door, he locked it and, pulling a chair over to the side of the bed, sat down to wait.

_--_

Tai San sat at Jetta's bedside as her husband sat at Jack's. The blue-haired girl was in a poor state, physically, but even worse mentally if Tai San's senses were right. The cuts, bruises and broken rib she could fix easily. The tears in the girl's aura were not so simple. It had taken her a while to learn how to use her sight properly, but even with the limited skill she had, she could see the dark colours winding round Jetta and the ragged, trailing rips in the girl's own aura. Someone, three someones to be precise, had battered a path through her defences to take complete control of her. There was no knowing how much permanent damage there was.

A movement startled Tai San out of her examination. Jetta was waking up. Walking over to the girl's side, she sat down on the bed and offered Jetta a glass of water.

"Thank you," Jetta replied, sitting up to take the glass from Tai San.

"How are you feeling?" Tai San asked.

"Like I've just been run over by a bus!"

"You have broken a rib. I have bound it as best I can, but I would advise you to stay here, in bed, and get plenty of rest."

"What about the hospital?"

"They will cope. Can I get you anything to eat? A book to read perhaps?"

"I'm starving! I wouldn't mind something to eat! Perhaps you could stay and fill me in on all the gossip: I'm sure I've got a lot to catch up on."

"Perhaps," Tai San rose, "but there has not really been much going on recently. I will get your food."

As Tai San stepped out of the room, she met Salene and Skye coming towards her.

"How is she?" Skye asked.

"She will be well," Tai San replied, smiling reassuringly at the young woman before her, "Her wounds are mostly superficial and exhaustion was the most likely cause of her collapse. There is a broken rib and many bruises to heal, but nothing life threatening. She is hungry though. Would you get her something? You know her tastes better than I."

Skye nodded and hurried off, leaving Tai San free to turn to Salene.

"Salene, you alone of all those in the mall right now know and understand what is really going on here, besides myself. For that reason, only you and I, and the others once they return, can have access to Jetta. Tell her nothing. Not even seemingly innocent gossip. She does not know of her condition, but that does not make her any less dangerous: if anything, it only makes her more so. She will ask innocent questions and expect innocent answers. The only answers it is safe to give her are evasive ones, such as "nothing much" or "not a lot"."

"I understand," Salene nodded, slowly, still wary of the unseen world she had been thrown into, "Do you want me to stay with her just now? You look like you could use a rest yourself and I don't think it's a great idea to leave her on her own."

"One of us must always be here," Tai San nodded, "if not inside the room, then outside the door, to make sure that she speaks to no-one else. I shall remain while she eats, but it would be odd if I hovered over her for the entire day. If you would come back and take over from me in an hour, we should be able to keep her free from suspicion until Lex returns at least."

_--_

May and her slowly dwindling entourage made their way into the city at last. A few more "players" had died during the last part of the journey and there were some that wouldn't last the night no matter what the hospital managed to do for them. The rest would last longer, but May wasn't sure how much.

"Straight to the hospital," May ordered her team, "As fast as we can. Let's get these people somewhere they can be helped."

Inside she added: "or just somewhere they can die in peace."

_--_

Jay spent most of the day wandering the city streets before finally reaching the mall. As he walked in he heard the sounds of familiar voices nearby. The voices stopped as he reached the fountain and were replaced by the sounds of running feet. In a moment, he was surrounded by familiar faces: Pride placing a supportive hand firmly on his shoulder; Trudy throwing her arms around him in a warm and comforting embrace; Brady trying to copy her mother, but only managing to hug his knees from behind and nearly knock him down; Amber, standing a little distance away, watching. He met her gaze and she looked away, shifting Bray from one shoulder to the other, then hurried off. Another young man, Sasha, Jay thought, met her as she hastened up the stairs and took the child from her before turning to accompany her up to the landing. The young Gaian Sasha had been walking down the stairs with stopped when he saw the scene, a flicker of emotion crossing his gently features, then continued to Trudy's side: Hawk, he thought.

When Trudy finally released her hold on Jay, and persuaded her daughter to do the same, Jay found he needed the support of Pride's hand to stop him falling backwards. When Trudy had finally finished telling him how well he looked and that if there was anything she could do, or if he ever wanted someone to talk to, just to let her know, Hawk managed to drag her away under the pretext of getting Brady some dinner. Once they had gone, Pride removed his hand.

"Come on," the tall Gaian said, quietly, "This way: it's quieter through here."

Jay followed Pride though a couple of corridors on the ground floor to a small room, one of the few in the mall with a proper door. Pride unlocked the door and stepped back to let Jay precede him into the room. A high window let in some light, but not much and Jay blinked when Pride turned on the lights and shut the door. The room was painted a green colour and contained a number of comfy chairs and a sofa, a round, wooden table surrounded by stools, a long, low table and a glass-fronted cabinet. On close inspection Jay found that the cabinet contained a number of bottles and glasses.

"What the..."

"Welcome to the 'den'!" Pride said, with a wry smile, "Not used much right now, but it has seen busier days."

"Whose room is this?" Jay asked. He had never seen it before and hadn't even been aware of its existence.

"Mine, Lex's, Slade's, Ryan's, yours. It's just a quite place for the guys of the mall to chill out in. It was Slade's idea. He and Lex built it, then proceeded to cream Patch, myself and occasionally Sasha at poker every chance they got, until Hawk decided to join us of course: even I can't tell when he's bluffing and I've known him for years!"

"I never knew it was here," Jay said, sitting down in one of the armchairs as Pride extracted a bottle and two glasses from the cabinet.

"Neither did I for a while. We were both... busy... when they built it. Patch was the first to be lured in: somewhere for him to relax while Slade and our wonderful City Leader taught him how to play poker. Ryan soon followed, of course. Sasha only found out after he got back. Hawk knew about it, but never really used it that much to begin with. It was Hawk that told me about it after... Well, when I needed somewhere to think and to be alone."

Jay accepted the glass from Pride and tasted its contents: whisky. He nodded in appreciation of both the spirit and of what Pride was trying to say: he had found this place useful after Salene lost the baby and while she was ill and he thought that Jay might also find it useful.

"Do the girls know about it?" Jay asked as Pride stretched out his long legs on the sofa.

"No, not so far as I know. At least, if they do, they haven't said anything."

"Isn't it rather Victorian, having a "men-only" room?"

"A bit, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have one," Pride gestured with his free hand, "This place is getting rather busy after all and, much as they may argue otherwise, the girls do seem to have effectively turned that nursery into a "women-only" room! Hawk is the only adult male who ever gets in there, whether there are kids in there or not!"

"So what do you do down here?"

"Oh, we play poker, a few other card games, share a drink occasionally, read, chat..."

"You mean gossip!"

"Er, yes, men can be just as bad as women at times: we just like to convince ourselves that what we're having is called a "serious, private conversation" rather than "gossip"! Besides, where else is it safe to talk about the girls. Or anything else for that matter..."

Jay caught what he was hinting at.

"I've named them, you know," he said, after a long pause, "Ebony and Ivory. They're so different, I can't believe they're twins! One, Ivory, is really pale, with fair hair and grey eyes. The other, E-Ebony..." Jay paused again, looking down at his drink, "she has my eyes, but her skin and hair are so dark!"

"I can't say I know exactly how you feel Jay," Pride said, slowly, "because I don't; but I do understand it a bit. We're on two sides of the same problem: I lost my child; you lost your children's mother. We're both grieving, but we're both wondering why one could live, and the other could not. It's selfish, because it makes us sound as though we don't understand why mother and child didn't both die, but in reality it's just the opposite: we don't understand why they didn't both survive. Am I right?"

Jay nodded, silently. There were tears on his own face, but he could also hear the other man's voice shake as he spoke. That was why they were both here. Both of them had gone through, were going through, that strange form of grief that is almost inseparable from the guilt that follows it; both needed to know that they were not alone.


	26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26

Jay and Pride had spent a few quiet, companionable hours in the 'den' before Pride eventually rose and said he had to go, or Salene would worry, assuming, of course, that she didn't know where he was. Jay nodded quietly and sat back in the armchair as the door closed behind Pride. Maybe it was the whisky, maybe it was a product of grief and nothing more, most likely it was a combination of the two, but as he closed his eyes he could swear he heard the notes of a tune he hadn't heard since his wedding day. It had been not long after Ebony had discovered she was pregnant, although they had been planning it for a few weeks. She had stood up there in front of everyone and sung to him. As the words came back to him now, he heard her sing it once more.

"_The right can stand_

_A thousand and one trials_

_The strong will never fall_

_But watching stars without you my soul cries_

_Heaving heart is full of pain_

_Oh, ohhh, the aching_

'_Cause I'm kissing you_

_I'm kissing you now_

_Touch me dear_

_Pure and true_

_Gift to me forever_

'_Cause I'm kissing you_

_Ohh_

_I'm kissing you now"_

The young father doubled over in heartfelt pain, dropping his glass and clutching his stomach. The door never opened, of that he was he was certain, but he felt slim, gentle fingers lift his chin and looked up, through eyes red and swimming with tears, into the beautiful, serene face of his late wife. As she lowered her lips to his, he felt his pain lessen and a warm calmness envelop him.

"_Where are you now?_

_Where are you now?_

'_Cause I'm kissing you_

_I'm kissing you now"_

_--_

Jack awoke with a start as the noise from the main ward rose with the arrival of May and her team with the final influx of Techno-induced patients for the growing hospital. He pushed himself up onto his elbows and looked around, noting his surroundings first and Lex's presence last. The city leader had remained sitting, quietly, watching Jack; now he rose.

"About time you woke up, mate!" Lex laughed, his countenance becoming suddenly cheerful, "How are you feeling?"

"Crp!" Jack replied, frowning in a way that made Lex almost laugh out loud: he seldom heard the young genius be so blunt!

"What's going through your head, mate? You look as though you're trying to unravel a Gordian knot!"

Jack shook his head distractedly and tentatively felt his face.

"I thought I had a cut," he explained, "It felt like I had a cut across my face, just here, and a bruise there and one on my side, but there's nothing there!"

"What do you remember?"

"What do you mean?" Jack's brow creased.

"Think back. What's the last thing you remember?"

"Ah, well, there's a lot of stuff that isn't clear, like a dream or something. The last thing I know was real was being in the basement of the hotel with the computers. I think Jay and Cloe were there. Then nothing and then the weird memories start. But like I say: they're like dreams or something. Not real."

"Uh-huh. Well, that would make sense," Lex shrugged, "That was where you were the first time you blacked out and you haven't really been that coherent since," Lex sniffed; he couldn't resist adding: "even by your standards!"

"Ha ha!" Jack replied, swivelling round to sit on the side of the bed, "Well, one thing I do have a clear memory of is Dee's wedding video; or, to be more precise, the pre-wedding part of it!"

"Yeah, yeah, the camera never lies. Come on, let's get you back to the mall before everyone starts thinking you've gone missing!"

"Yeah," Jack sighed and ran a hand through his hair, "Jetta's gonna be screaming blue murder if I don't start spending more time with her soon!"

"Ah, Jetta, right. Listen, mate, there are a few things you should know before you get back to the mall and we'd best get them out of the way before we leave here."

"What?" Jack turned, suddenly panicked, "She's not left me has she?"

"No, not that, but she's not entirely herself just now. Listen mate," Lex steered Jack into the chair he had occupied before the younger man had woken up, "You were... ill... for quite a while and now you're well, but Jetta's still ill."

"What happened?" Jack's frown increased.

"Okay," Lex looked around for something to help him explain what he had to tell Jack, but there was nothing, "Okay, this is gonna be kinda hard to believe mate, but just let me finish, okay?"

Jack nodded and Lex leant back against the bed.

"Well, you know those dreams you had while you were out of it? Well, they're not exactly dreams. They're not exactly memories either, well, not your memories: they're Jetta's."

Jack's eyebrows went up an inch or two, but he said nothing and remained seated so Lex continued.

"Hmph, right, so whenever these things you saw in your dreams happened to Jetta, you felt them and saw them just as she did. You felt them because she was calling out to you for help, in a way. She didn't know she was doing it, didn't even know it was possible, neither did I until recently. Truth is, mate, you might have always thought that Ellie was the love of your life and your "soulmate" but she never was: Jetta is. Jetta is your soulmate. There is a bond between you that, now that it's been re-forged in this lifetime, tells each of you when the other is in danger. It's the kind of bond that strengthens and protects. Someone tried to break that bond so that they could use Jetta to spy on us. They succeeded, and you've been unbearably cheerful ever since, but I don't know how much of that you'll remember. If they hadn't broken the bond, they could still have controlled Jetta for a while, but as soon as she saw you, her loyalties would revert back to normal. Right now, she's in the mall in a pretty bad way. Looks like she got beat up on the way home. You won't feel that because the bond was broken by then. It still is. You remember her, but she won't remember you. At all. Everyone else, yes, but you, no. At least, if Cat's right about what spell they used. You were fairly helpful in that respect, mate. You might have been sleeping or whatever, but you could answer our questions about what was going on and could even tell us snatches of what they were saying. That helped a lot. Problem is, we need your help even more now: you are the only one who can bring Jetta back to us. You have to re-forge the bond. It won't be as easy as when you first met when you got back from the Technos: you'll have to start right back at the beginning and we've no way of knowing how far back that goes!"

Lex reached the end of his lengthy explanation and watched Jack's countenance go through a series of changes. Eventually, he looked up.

"Putting aside the fact that I'm a scientist and what you're talking about is magic and I don't, or at least I didn't, believe in all that stuff, I think I understand all of that except for a few points. You said a couple of things there that are starting to worry me: "in this lifetime", "right back to the beginning", "how far back"? You sound like you're saying we've all been through this before? In another life?"

Lex looked at his feet, then back up at Jack. There was no real way of sugaring the pill.

"Yeah. When our bodies die, our souls move on and are reborn some time later. Our actions in one life are affected by our previous lives and then affect our later lives. The bonds we forge in one lifetime, of family, friendship or love, are reproduced in the next in some way. All our bad deeds are punished, all our good deeds rewarded. Some mistakes we are doomed to make over and over again. Some people we are blessed to fall in love with over and over again. Everything balances out eventually."

"Where does it end?"

"Who knows," Lex shrugged, "I'm fairly new to this myself, so I don't know everything, but I do know that there are some things we are not meant to know and will never know."

"And what happens if I don't re-form, forge, the bond between Jetta and myself?"

"We can't be sure. Short-term, she will be a threat to the city and much more vulnerable to whoever it is that is controlling her. She's not much of a danger while she's recovering from the beating she got on her way back to the mall, but after that, who knows. She won't be an obvious threat and only a few of us know about magic and its involvement."

"Who?"

"Us, obviously, Cat, Aeryn, Tai San and Salene. No more as far as I know."

"And what about the long term danger, if the bond stays broken?"

"There is no way of knowing. Everything might reverse itself back to normal after you both die, or it may not. Jetta may remain in the power of the triad who cast the spell until the bond is re-forged, different lifetimes regardless!"

"Triad?"

"Three witches, joined by blood, either forcibly, by certain spells and rituals, or by actually being related. It is generally frowned upon to join three forcibly, because it is an unnatural thing and that goes against the nature of magic, however illogical that may sound to your mind, but the three are almost always stronger than three bound by family ties. It is a powerful number and they would be at their most powerful together, as they were when the spell was cast."

"And I take it they're not on our side."

"No."

"And I take it we don't have three witches of our own to fight them?"

"Um..."

"What?"

"Technically, we do."

_--_

Cat had left the hospital some time earlier and had been sitting with Salene by the unconscious Jetta's bed. After reporting all of Jetta's movements and mumblings since she had been placed in the room, Salene had fallen silent and Cat had turned her thoughts inward to mull over what she had learned. Although she had asked the occasional polite question, Salene had skirted round the issue she had been wanting to discuss. At last she could stand it no more.

"Why can I hear your thoughts when you talk to Lex?" Salene asked, suddenly.

Cat looked up and regarded the red-haired young woman for a moment.

"Magic is not something reserved for the few, Salene," she replied, choosing her words with great care, "it is in every one of us. It is a force that lies dormant until something, or someone, causes it to show itself. When we are young, we 'believe' in magic. Belief has nothing to do with it. When we are young, we _know_ magic exists, that it lives in us. That knowledge is merely wiped out by our grown-up, so-called 'common sense'! The magic is still there, latent, under the surface.

It is different from person to person, just like any other attribute or characteristic. Some recognise it, others do not. Some are stronger than others, although everyone's strength increases with age and training. A person's specific abilities vary with their bloodline. Often, certain ethnic groups share a peculiar gift, such as Tai San's. Not so much her ability to tell the future: that is not particularly peculiar, indeed almost every culture has some method of doing so. No, it is the manner in which she sees the unknown that sets her apart: her dreams and visions while meditating. In her, it is so strong that the shadows and omens, of past present and future, were able to form in her mind before she even knew what they were, let alone how to control or call them.

Similarly, specific families pass on and share specific traits. I have taught myself spell-casting and scrying, but the gift shared by all my family is our telepathy: the ability to communicate without speech. Logic and 'common sense' block our thoughts from the outside world, from those who do not possess or cannot use the same or a similar gift. Those with latent ability, as long as their adult minds do not get in the way, can hear us. I thought it was a rare gift, but so far I have found two bloodlines able to hear my talks with my brother. Neither, however, seem able to join in the conversation. This may be due to inexperience in both cases, but I would like to find out more about _your_ abilities."

"But you said two bloodlines: every kid in the mall has taken a dislike to you!"

"I thought so too at first. I thought that all children below a certain age would hear Lex and I communicate, but I was wrong. I have come across many children of a suitable age at the hospital: none of them could hear us. As for every kid in the mall, well, so far there are only two and those two are apparently cousins: the offspring of two brothers, both of whom are now dead."

"Brady and Zac. Zoot and Bray. Of course!"

"They are one bloodline. You are another. What is more, you are strong."

"I-I can't be. I've never even believed in magic for years!"

"That does not affect how strong your gift is. Let me tell you of strong and powerful magi. They often know nothing of their power until some accident forces them to use it. They are often people who are drawn strongly to the care and protection of others, either through healing or some other method. All fiercely desire parenthood, but often have difficulty achieving it. When they fail to do so, their emotions can crash and spiral violently out of control, leading to alcoholism, depression, suicide attempts and even temporary insanity or amnesia. They will make good leaders, however, despite all this, and people will trust and follow them, but they will only assume the mantle of a leader because they feel they have to, not because they want to. Does any of this sound familiar?"


	27. Chapter 27

Chapter 27

Salene and Cat sat with Tai San in Lex and Tai San's room, drinking tea. Lex and Jack had been with Jetta for over an hour and still neither had come through to report anything, bad or good. That meant things were either making slow progress or none at all. Salene and Tai San looked at each other awkwardly and remained silent. Cat appeared to be concentrating on something.

It was well into the darkest part of the night now and indeed it seemed to get darker by the minute. May had finally returned with a large group of kids and it seemed that ever time someone returned to the mall from the hospital they brought news of more deaths. Already, twenty had died since they reached the city and May and Kaz had reported an even greater number of burials along the road. They had retrieved every victim's name from the Techno files and the kid's barcodes, however, and every grave had a marker, a name and a location and every detail was being added to the hospital files. When the worst was over, and the work could begin on redecorating the hospital once more, there would be a mural painted on one of the walls in the corridor outside the main ward depicting the island and its new burial sites. Each site had a name and number and under those headings would be listed the name and tribe of every person buried there, along with a picture taken from the Techno files. It was a very long corridor, with wide expanses of smooth white walls, but every day Patch and his hospital staff grew more and more afraid that there wouldn't be enough room for all the names. Above all, they hoped and prayed that Patsy's would not be among them, and that Eagle Mountain would not have to go on the map.

Eventually, Lex and Jack appeared in the doorway of Lex's room.

"She's sleeping," Lex said, before any of the girls could ask him anything, "and I'm just gonna take Jack to his room and make sure he gets some sleep too."

Cat nodded without looking up and Salene stood up.

"I should really go too," she said, "It's late after all."

"No, we've still got a bit of work to do, Sal," Lex replied, "That's why I wanted you to wait on me joining you in here."

Salene sat down again and Cat looked over to her brother.

"We'll be ready for you when you get back," she said.

Lex nodded and led Jack off to his own room.

"Ready for what?" Salene asked.

"You've stopped hearing me, Salene," Cat replied, avoiding the red-haired girl's question, "Is your memory coming back?"

"No," Salene frowned, puzzled.

Cat nodded and got up. Moving quietly about the room, she brought another chair into their circle, for Lex, and brought a small wooden chest over to her own seat. As she sat down again, Lex walked in and closed the door behind him.

"You remember what I was telling you, Salene?" Cat asked, "About different magical abilities being shared between different bloodlines?"

"Yes," Salene replied, uncertainly.

"Well, I have a theory as to what your ability may be. You always took care of the younger kids when the virus first hit, didn't you?"

"Yes."

"And, when you first met Bray, and when Trudy, whom you spent so much time with, thought she was in love with Bray, you also felt that you were in love with him?"

Salene shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

"Yes," she replied.

"And then, when Ryan spent so much time with you, helping you with your eating problems, and when he felt himself falling in love with you, you also felt yourself falling in love with him?"

"I guess so."

"But then, when he was taken from you, that feeling faded and you found yourself being wooed by Pride, whom you them proceeded to fall in love with."

"I-I'm not sure. I don't remember that clearly."

"No, I know. But you do remember Pride."

"I remember what I feel for him, really. I have no solid memories of him, just feelings."

"Yes. That's what I thought. All that you remember, from the blank space your amnesia has provided, are feelings, correct?"

Salene frowned again and shuffled uncomfortably.

"Yes," she said, not meeting Cat's eyes.

"We think you're and empath, Sal," Lex said, leaning forward, "You feel what others feel. Ryan wanted you and he to be a couple, therefore you wanted the same. Trudy wanted Bray, so you wanted him too."

"It would not have happened all the time," Tai San cut in, "Most of the time it would just be when the individuals themselves were dealing with too many emotions. Trudy had way too much on her emotion plate, so some of her obsession with Bray spilled over onto the first receptive being: you. Ryan was so consumed with concern for you and for the tribe, and with other matters of his own, that his dream of his marrying you became your dream also, and then a reality. You were more sensitive to what the younger children were feeling and needing, so you became their mother figure. It is a great gift..."

"However, it is also a confusing one," Cat finished, "We must try and help your memory come back. Not too much too soon, or we may push it deeper in your mind rather than bring it towards the surface, but we must speed up the process somewhat, then Tai San will begin training you to control your gift."

"What if my memory does not come back?" Salene asked.

Cat and Lex exchaned a glance and Salene felt a wave of doubt flow through her, followed by reassurance, but heard nothing.

"One way or another, it will return," Cat said soothingly, "There was no physical damage to your mind, therefore any other kind of damage cannot remain indefinitely. I would merely rather your memories returned sooner rather than later."

_--_

"Lena?" Ryan murmured as he felt the girl turn to face him when he finally got into bed.

"It's okay, I was awake anyway. What is it?"

"I was thinking, when the house is finished, wouldn't it be nice to go into it properly?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean me carrying you over the threshold, like couples are supposed to when they move into their first home."

"That's just married couples, silly!" Helena giggled and kissed Ryan on the nose.

He remained silent for a moment, then lifted her chin to look into her eyes through the darkness of their room.

"Yes, I know," he replied.


	28. Chapter 28

Chapter 28

Salene picked at her breakfast, trying to make it look as though she was eating it. She had barely slept last night, thinking over what she had been told and what she had seen. She glanced up at Pride, then back down to her bowl. Both Cat and Tai San had assured her that her recognition of Pride could only have happened if she really did love him, but the worry remained that she was merely feeling for him what he wanted her to feel and nothing more. She frowned, trying to focus her mind on remembering the past she had lost. Why had it vanished from her memory? She had woken up, wondered where she was, and thought that she had lost Ryan's baby and now she had to find him and tell him. She had looked around and seen that the Chosen were nowhere in sight, but also that she didn't recognise anyone. She had got up and crept out of the room, around the sleeping form of the man she now recognised as her lover. She remembered pain. She had thought it was from her miscarriage, but now she could remember that too and it was different. The pain she remembered from just before she had woken up was more intense: like searing hot blades ripping her apart. She had heard that description before, but where? Salene racked her brain: childbirth, it was the pain of childbirth. But if she had given birth, where was her baby? And why did she think she had miscarried? Was it a post-natal depression thing, like Trudy had once had? Or was there more? Salene was sure there was, but she couldn't remember.

"Pride?" Salene said, quietly, her voice shaking a little with apprehension, "Where's _our_ baby?"

If the barely controlled look on Pride's face hadn't given the truth away, the wave of emotions, grief, anger, pity, confusion and many others, that washed over Salene told her instantly all that she needed to know. As if a dam had burst in her mind, memories began flowing back and flooding her consciousness. She rose from her seat at the small table and rushed out of the room.

Pride looked about him, confused and worried, rising to his feet to follow as he did so. He felt a hand on his arm, stopping him, and turned to see Lex holding him back. The city leader shook his head and motioned for Pride to sit down again. The Gaian watched Tai San hurry out of the room after Salene.

"She has a better idea of what's going on in Sal's mind, mate," Lex explained as Pride returned to his chair, "Trust me!"

The other Mallrats present also wore worried expressions, but some had returned to talking amongst themselves. Amber and Trudy were whispering over the heads of their offspring while Sasha and Hawk ate in respectful silence and occasionally glanced over in Pride's direction. Skye and Slade were quietly bickering in a corner while the other occupants of their table, Jack, Angie and Josh pulled faces and made hushed comments, presumably at the arguing couple's expense. Jay was notably absent, as was Jetta of course, and for some reason Cloe was gone too, but then Cloe hardly ever showed up at breakfast anymore.

_--_

"You have to go," Ved murmured, looking down at Cloe as she lay beside him in their bed.

"Why? It's early yet."

"Only in here. Time moves differently in here. You have to go back to the mall and get something to eat."

"I'm not hungry. Anyway, I'd rather be with you."

"You're not hungry because you're in here. In the real world, your body needs food. You've been missing too many meals to spend time with me."

"I'm fine!"

"All the same, go and get some breakfast. Real breakfast, in the real world. It's not like I'm going anywhere, anyway."

Cloe reached up and kissed him. He returned the kiss, gently, then pushed her away from him.

"I love you. Now go."

"I love you too," Cloe smiled, "I'll come back later."

Ved watched as she faded from his sight. In his now computerised mind, he felt her wake up in the real world and remove her headset, switching off the set as she did so. He sighed. She would come back later, he knew, and she would keep coming back, if he let her, until she could no longer leave. It was getting harder to get her to go, even now, and he was certain there was no way he could persuade her not to return. There was only one way to stop her becoming trapped as he was and, as much as it hurt him, it was the only thing he could do to let her move on and live her own life.

Ved sat up on the side of the bed and concentrated for moment. When he opened his eyes, he found himself back in the Techno control room, in his old uniform. The only difference was that Ram was no longer there, shouting orders. Ved looked up at the computer before him and started typing. Around him, various virtual worlds flickered on the monitors: the worlds he and Jack had created for the others trapped in Operation Dormouse.

The people in those worlds would never grow old and die; there was no starvation, no illness or disease, no poverty. There wasn't even any war... yet! So far, the worlds were almost perfect. The only things missing in every one of those worlds were children. Not the kids who had been trapped there by the programme in the first place, but _their_ children. The problem with their perfect world was that it was static - it couldn't move on or evolve. The old would not grow up and pass away, the young would not come forth to take their place. The cycle of life was gone, broken forever, and, as yet, Ved knew of no way in which he could restore it. All he could do, was stop it from claiming another victim.

Cloe would be a great mother. He wanted her to grow older and have kids and teach them all she had learned about life. He had wanted them to be his kids, but that was no longer possible. He had wanted to grow old with her, but that was impossible now too. The only thing he could do was let her grow old with someone else, have someone else's children, be someone else's wife. He finished typing. It was done. He would never see her again, but she was free. The only people who could access his files now were Jack and Jay. He could add more people if he wished - he would have to one day - but for now they were the only ones who could run the risks of the programme and they at least knew what those risks really were.

_--_

Jetta opened her eyes and winced. Every muscle and every bone in her body ached. She glanced around the room. It was her room, but the curtains were closed and it was dark so she couldn't tell if there were any others in the room with her. She thought there must have been, for it had been someone calling her name that had woken her. Three someones, in fact. She had heard three voices, all female, calling to her and telling her to wake up, telling her that she was stronger than her injuries and that she was needed. They were blind, they needed her to see for them, to be their eyes. Wincing as she moved, Jetta reached a hand over and pulled back the blanket covering her. Her usual clothes had been replaced with a nightdress, so she slowly and steadily pulled clean clothes from the drawers opposite the bed and dressed herself in the darkness. She had to do what was needed. It was her duty.


	29. Chapter 29

Chapter 29

Naduah sat, silently, beneath the tree, listening to the world around her. She didn't know how long she had been there, but from the change in the sounds around her, she knew that the world had already crossed the barrier into night. She rose to her feet, preparing to make the short journey back to the Gaian camp, then stopped. There had been a faint sound off to her right. It could have been one of the many nocturnal creatures of the forest, but something about it had made the Gaian leader stop and take a tighter grip on her walking staff.

The sound continued: quiet shuffling noises, like a mouse in the leaf-litter of the forest floor, but farther apart. The noises had gone past her now, down towards the river. Naduah cautiously followed the path they had taken. As she drew near to the water, the footsteps, for footsteps she was now certain they were, were drowned out by the noise of the torrent. She followed as best she could, unwilling to let go of her quarry: a characteristic which had won her her Gaian name of Badger.

Cutting through the rushing cacophony of the water, Naduah heard the sound of sobs.

"Who's there?" Nadua ventured.

"Go away!" May's voice yelled back, tearfully.

"May, what are you doing here? I thought you were in the city?"

"I left. I took my team back and then I left. I can't stand it there! Everywhere you turn, there's death! It surrounds you, i-it... it... infects you. I hate it!"

"Then fine, don't stay there. Come back to the camp with me. Stay with us. Become a Gaian. You would be welcome."

May shook her head and then realised Naduah couldn't see her response.

"No," she said, wiping away tears and sniffing, "not really. I'm not welcome anywhere really. I'm just a drifter. A stray cat some tribes have taken in and sheltered for a while. I've never _belonged_ anywhere, you know? Never really put down roots."

"Well surely there is no better place to put down roots than in a forest," Naduah smiled, finding herself a seat next to May.

"There was a time, once, when I would gladly have come out here and spent the rest of my life in this forest," May said quietly, "But the man I would have done that for didn't love me: he wanted someone else. It's the story of my life really. Everywhere I look, I find that everyone's looking at someone else!"

"Maybe you should stop looking, then?"

"Maybe."

"Come back with me. Spend the night with us at least. See how you feel in the morning."

"I don't know..."

"Come on, May: you can't stay out here all night."

May looked over her shoulder at the raging flood of water behind her. Staying out all night hadn't been the plan anyway, but maybe Naduah was right and she would be hard to get rid of now anyway. She got to her feet, taking the Gaian leader's hand, and let the blind woman lead her through the now pitch dark forest with more surety than May would have had in broad daylight.

_--_

"Cloe, open the door!" Salene cried, hammering on the wooden door with the heel of her hand.

It had been a busy day at the mall, as well as at the hospital. When Cloe had finally turned up, some hours after breakfast, she had received a message from Paul at the hospital: Patsy had woken up. It had been late when she had finally got back to the mall and she had only stopped to eat some dinner before heading off in the direction of the hotel. Just twenty minutes later, she was back, Jack dragging her along in his arms. She had been in hysterics then and was still crying now, some five hours later. When Salene, still getting used to the pain of her own loss, had asked Jack what all the fuss was about, he told her that Ved had locked everyone out of his programme. Everyone including Cloe. The only people with access to his files now were Jack himself and Jay. Cloe wasn't taking this news well.

"You need to rest," Pride told Salene, wrapping his arms around her as he spoke, "You've hardly had the easiest day yourself."

"But, Pride, she's hurting! She's really, really hurting!"

"I know, but so are you. Besides, she's locked herself in there with no intention of coming out any time soon. She needs time."

"Perhaps I could help?" Jetta asked from behind the couple.

"N-no, Jetta," Salene said hastily, "It's okay. If I can't get through to her soon, I'll go over to the hospital and see how Patsy is bearing up: she might respond better to her best friend."

"What about Josh? She was rather close to him before wasn't she?"

"Not quite the right person for this though," Pride replied.

"Okay," Jetta shrugged.

"Why don't you try and get some sleep, Jetta," Salene suggested, "It's getting late."

"Yeah," Pride added, "we were just going to turn in ourselves."

"Were you?" Jetta asked, looking pointedly at Salene.

"I guess so," Sal replied, "There's not much more we can do here tonight."

_--_

"Report," Chrisma ordered the young witch bent over the scrying bowl.

"There is little of use, Chrisma," the witch replied, her eyes reflecting the inky depths of the bowl before her, "They appear to be treating her somewhat differently."

"She has just woken up today," Chrisma shrugged, "I expect we shall have to wait until they see her as being fully fit and back to her normal self before they trust her again."

"We shall take it in turns to monitor the situation, though," the third witch cut in.

"How long will that take?" asked the fourth person in the room.

"You would know better than I," Chrisma laughed, "Are they not your own tribe, after all!"

The fourth woman stood up and moved to look out a window at the night sky. It was a while before she answered, but finally she turned back to the triad and replied, with a cold-blooded conviction:

"Not any more."

_--_

Zed lay awake in his bed, looking out of the window at the bright, starlit sky. He was in a small attic room in the farm. Directly beneath the room where he slept was Alice's room, with Denver's cot in a corner, and across the hall from her was Aeryn's room, where she and Micah slept.

The farm had, at Alice's insistence, been renamed Amazon Farm shortly after he had returned and it had set the wheels of Zed's mind in motion. Why did he stay here? He had never stayed so long in one spot since the virus. Even before that, he had spent so much time travelling. Now he was stationary. And for what? For a woman who would never return his feelings? Alice had all the help, around the farm, that she needed now. There was no legitimate reason for him to stay. It was time to leave. In the morning, he would pack his bags and head out, away from the city, back on the road.

_--_

Patsy lay in her bed at the hospital, also unable to sleep. In the bed on one side of her, her brother slept peacefully, unwilling to leave her side even to rest. On her other side, lay a young girl who seemed to her strangely familiar. She knew she hadn't been the only one to notice it, but she didn't know why she felt she recognised the girl. The child was only about eight or nine years old, not much older than Brady. While the younger girls soft features and oval face were relaxed in sleep, Patsy felt the feeling of recognition increase, but she still could not work out why.

_--_

Jack sat in his room, nursing a glass of whisky he had brought up from the new "men-only" room he had recently been introduced to. The lyrics of the music playing gently in the background swam around his head.

_When your day is long and the night  
The night is yours alone  
When you're sure you've had enough of this life  
Well hang on  
Don't let yourself go, 'cause everybody cries  
and everybody hurts, sometimes ...  
_

He had spent most of the morning, trying to get through to Jetta, but she had either ignored him completely and walked off somewhere or watched him blankly as he spoke. She never showed any emotion towards him and that hurt him more than anything. If she had been angry with him or at him, or if she had been hurt and crying and hated him more than anything on earth, it would still be better than this total indifference that he now faced.

_Sometimes everything is wrong,  
Now it's time to sing along  
When your day is night alone  
If you feel like letting go  
If you think you've had too much of this life  
Well hang on  
_

He finished off the last of the whisky and flung himself onto his bed.

_'Cause everybody hurts  
Take comfort in your friends  
Everybody hurts  
Don't throw your hand, oh no  
Don't throw your hand  
If you feel like you're alone  
no, no, no, you're not alone  
_

He had eventually escaped that afternoon to the hotel, only to find Cloe in tears because Ved had locked her out of the system. Jack hadn't told the others this, but while Ved was locking down his own files, he had locked Cloe out of the system altogether. When Jack had spoken to Ved he had explained that he was afraid Cloe would deliberately try to get herself stuck in the system if he hadn't.

_If you're on your own in this life  
The days and nights are long  
When you think you've had too much  
of this life, to hang on  
_

Jack understood Cloe's pain, the pain of being permanently separated from a loved one, but in a way he thought she was lucky. The separation between her and Ved had been forged because of, rather than in spite of, their love: whatever way you looked at it, you knew he loved her and she loved him. So much was this the case that they were both willing to sacrifice everything for the other: Cloe would give her life to be with him; Ved would give up the woman he loved just to keep her safe.

_Well everybody hurts,  
sometimes, everybody cries,  
And everybody hurts ...  
Sometimes_

Jack didn't have that with Jetta. With Jetta, there were no noble sentiments keeping them apart, only magic. Magic: something the scientist in Jack found almost impossible to believe in. Almost.

_But everybody hurts sometimes  
So hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on,  
hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on._


	30. Chapter 30

Chapter 30

The days passed. Jack began to give up hope. At Cloe's request, he had gone to talk to Ved. When he was there he decided there was more work needing done in the hotel than back at the mall and stayed there for two full days until Ved finally talked him into going back to try again. When he got back, he found Jetta as indifferent as he had left her. There always seemed to be someone with her: Salene one morning, Tai San that evening, Aeryn some other time.

"Can I get you a coffee?" Jack asked the blue-haired girl when he joined her and Tai San in the cafe.

"I'm fine, thanks," Jetta replied barely turning in his direction to answer, then immediately returning to her conversation with Tai San.

Jack shrugged and walked over to the counter, pouring out a mug of coffe for himself anyway. For a time he just stood, staring at the mug of steaming liquid in his hands, ignoring the pain of the heat radiating through the mug itself. Eventually Tai San walked over to him.

"Give it time, Jack. These things do not heal quickly. In most cases there has to be some sort of trigger."

"It's been weeks, Tai San!" Jack cried, replacing the mug on the counter and turning to his friend, "How much longer can it take?"

"Jack, the forces we are dealing with here are not ones that work on a schedule of minutes, hours, days or weeks: it could take years, maybe more."

"I could be dead this time next year!" Jack yelled, angrily, "And so could she!"

"Then the work would begin again in your next life. You wouldn't remember anything of this one of course, you would have to rely on fate to do its work."

"Aw, that's just great! Fate! I have to rely on Fate! Now I know I'm doomed!"

"Jack," Tai San placed a comforting hand on her friend's shoulder, "I know it must be difficult, I know it must hurt, but once you accept that there is a more powerful entity shaping your destiny, whether you like what they give you or not, then you'll find it gets easier."

"But how do you know that, Tai San? How do you _know_ that, when we die, we don't just become a pile of dust? That I won't just end up rotting in a grave somewhere and that Jetta..."

Jack broke off mid-exclamation, his hand gesturing to the place where Jetta had been. Tai San followed his startled gaze and swore like her husband might have. Without another word, the two rushed out of the cafe and split up to search the mall for the missing Jetta.

_--_

Patch leant over the young girl, checking her vital signs. Everything seemed fine. A number of people had commented to the young doctor on a feeling of familiarity around the child and it was true that Patch felt the same. Who it was that she reminded him of, he couldn't say, but the feeling of recognition was there nonetheless and had only increased that morning when she had woken up at last.

"So," Patch asked his patient, gently, having completed his examination, "what's your name?"

"Sophie," the child replied, quietly.

"Well, Sophie," Patch continued, "can you tell me how old you are?"

The child shook her head.

"My momma said I was born just before the virus. She ran away from home to have me."

That would make her about seven, maybe eight, Patch thought.

"And where's your momma?"

"She went to the angels a long time ago," the child answered Her tribe looked after me. We heard that there were adults here and we came back, but it was just nasty boys in funny masks and they took us all away and locked us up. They took our airy-planes too!"

"Y-your planes?" Patch said, startled.

The child nodded.

"We came over in them. Only some of us. I was allowed to come 'cause my momma came from here."

"Where are you from?" Patch asked, incredulously.

"'Cross the big water," Sophie replied, rubbing her nose with her sleeve, "Can't remember the word for it."

"The sea?" Patch asked.

Sophie nodded then looked down at her hands, aware of the change in Patch's interrogation methods.

"Was your father from here too?"

The young girl shook her head.

"He was from far away. My momma used to tell me a story about him. She said that once, there was this lonely princess who lived far away in a castle with her mother and father and two sisters. Every day she would sing, hoping that some handsome prince would hear her and come to her rescue. Then one day her older sister went out riding and never came back. The King and Queen told the younger princesses that their older sister had had an accident and had gone to be with the angels. The lonely princess was so upset that when her handsome prince came along, she almost didn't notice. But he heard her singing and he carried her away everyday to somewhere she could be happy. And she was happy for a while, but when she went home again, she wasn't happy. Then she found out that there was a life growing inside her and she and the handsome prince decided to run away together so that they could be happy all the time. They were going to go to his homeland, far, far away, but they had to stop in a strange land because the handsome prince was getting ill. When the handsome prince got ill, the lonely princess was sad. She looked after him until he went to be with the angels too, then she tried to go home, but she was stuck in the strange land. Lots of people were getting sick and she was scared that, when the time for the life inside her to join the world, it wouldn't survive long. But the life did survive and the lonely princess called it her little miracle and loved it with all her heart."

"And that lonely princess was your momma?" Patch asked, tentatively.

Sophie nodded.

"What was her name, Sophie? I know you called her momma, but what did the rest of her tribe call her?"

The little girl thought hard for a while, her small brow furrowed in concentration.

"Devon," she said finally.

Patch nodded, then got to his feet.

"You get some sleep now, Sophie. I'll see if I can find anyone here who might remember your momma."

Patch walked over to where Dee, the bump of her own pregnancy showing clearly now, awaited him. Taking his wife's arm, the bespectacled doctor led Dee into the office.

"Did you hear all that?" Patch asked.

"Yeah," Dee nodded, "Don't know if I've ever heard of anyone called Devon, though, or anyone missing a sister. But then, it's not really the sort of thing you talk about these days."

"You're thinking what I'm thinking, then: that the youngest sister might still be here?"

"She might. She might not. She may have gone looking for Devon after the virus hit, or she may even be dead, but if we're going to find her, and I'm guessing that's what you want me to do, here is the best place to start."

"I would appreciate it if you would concentrate on finding her aunt."

"If I would stay out of the way of the remaining players, you mean! I'm passed the most dangerous bit now and there are far fewer of them than there used to be!"

"All the same: I know you'll do everything you can and I know that only Lex has more contacts in this city than you have and that you are smarter and prettier and..."

"Yeah, yeah, flattery will get you everywhere!" Dee laughed, kissing her husband on the cheek, "Did you get the hospital records up and running again?"

"More or less."

"Then I guess I'll start there. Maybe later I'll have a chat with Sophie and see if she knows any more about her mother's family here. Names are always helpful!"

_--_

Jetta peered around the corner of the door. Inside the room sat the woman known as Cat. She was the City Leader's sister, Jetta remembered. The City leader himself was also in the room, but he was not sitting; instead he paced back and forth restlessly.

"I wish I knew where they were!" Lex cried, throwing his hands up in despair, "Or at least _who_ they were! We know Chrisma's one of them, but Jack said there were another _three_ before! Chrisma, the two other witches and a fourth one standing in the shadows! How can you fight something when you don't know who or what it is, or where it is!"

"Wherever they are, it is protected. I've tried every method of scrying I know and I can't find them. They're cloaked. I even found out where Chrisma was staying before and went round there, but the whole place had been cleared out and thoroughly cleaned! We have to persist with the manual search. I know it takes time, but it's all we've got. They can't be outside of the city, or they'd be too far away to control Jetta: there has to be a link there all the time."

"Well if that's the case, why don't we just take Jetta and get her as far away from here as we can!"

"Because as soon as you brought her back within range of them, she would be back under their control! You can't just ship her off somewhere forever, Lex. Not even with Jack in tow. Breaking the bond that is controlling her will not make it any easier to re-establish her bond with Jack."

"So, what? We just sit here and wait?"

"Precisely."

"And if we do find them, what then?"

"Who knows. We don't know what powers they have. We don't know if it even iis/i just the four of them. Even if we capture them, there is no guarantee we can find out what spell they used."

"And there's nothing you can do to break it?"

"You have the vast majority of my memories, Lex, you know there isn't. I've tried everything I can, but the ensorcelment they are using must have some kind of a key, most likely blood as that was what Jack saw them take from her, but we can't rule out the possibility that they took something else as well. Even assuming the key is the blood they took, we would still have to find that and destroy it and the way things are going, I can't see that being easy without first finding Chrisma and her group."

Lex rubbed his chin with his hand.

"What if we repeated the spell ourselves? Or at least what we think they most likely used."

"Point one: We don't know what spell they most likely used - there are at least a dozen with all the elements Jack described. Point two: you would only be adding one ensorcelment on top of another, like painting over a crack in the wall, the first ensorcelment would remain and Jetta would be torn between two masters. Psychologically, she would be brought to the very edge of sanity at best and might suffer permanent damage at worst. Psychically, or magically, whichever way you want to put it, her aura would become so drained that she could literally fade out of existence. Point three: we would need a coven to execute such a spell and we don't have one."

"Don't we?" Lex asked, impatiently, "I thought a coven was three witches joined by blood, naturally or unnaturally. Don't we have a natural coven right here? You, me and Aeryn?"

"Aeryn's powers are weak. I barely had the chance to teach her anything before the virus and have had even less opportunity since."

"Then we can start training her now. Like you said: I know everything you know, well, mostly. We could take it in turns."

"You have your duties as City Leader, Lex, and Aeryn has a young baby to look after. We will find another way. I will start training her, now that she is back at the farm, but not for this and not intensively. I don't know the effect it would have on Micah."

Jetta started, suddenly, hearing footsteps along the corridor and someone calling her name. Silently, she darted along another passageway and out of sight.

_--_

"Did you get all that?" Chrisma crowed to her companions as the visions in the scrying bowl faced into inky blackness.


	31. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31 The Mage Wars**

"_This old guitar taught me to sing a love song_

_Told me how to laugh and how to cry_

_Introduced me to some friends of mine_

_Brightened up some days_

_Helped me make it through some lonesly nights woah _

_What a friend to have on a cold and lonely night_

_This old guitar gave me my lovely lady_

_It opened up her eyes and ears to me_

_It brought us close together_

_I guess it broke her heart_

_It opened up a space for us to be_

_What a lovely place, a lovely space to be_

_This old guitar gave me my life, my living_

_All the things you know I love to do_

_To serenade the stars that shine from a sunny mountain side_

_And most of all, to sing my songs to you_

_I love to sing my songs for you_

_Yes I do you know_

_I love to sing my songs for you"_

Jay watched his daughters sleeping peacefully as he finished his song and layed the, by now _very_ old guitar to one side. He didn't have as wonderful a voice as their mother, but the melodic acoustics of the guitar seemed to ease the girls into sleep and his familiarity with that instrument at least was a talent he could boast.

It had been five years since his wife had died, the fight to bring their daughters into the world ultimately destroying her small body. As he watched the twin girls sleep, he thought how much like her mother the young Ebony was becoming, even at such an early age. In sleep, when the image of her face was not disrupted by the dark brown eyes she had inherited from himself, she appeared even more like her namesake. Ivory, on the other hand, reminded him often of his brother: so like himself in looks, but with grey eyes that flashed when she was angry, grey eyes she had inherited from her mother and learned to use in the same way when she didn't get something she wanted. Well, not _quite_ the same way.

A lot had changed in the past five years. The mage wars had remained the same, however, ever since the city became aware of them. They were locked in a deadlock that had almost become a part of life, waging war against an enemy they could never more than catch a glimpse of. It had all started with Jetta's kidnapping and later return, of course, Jay reflected, though he and the rest of the city knew nothing of its significance at the time.

Jetta hadn't been well known to the Mallrats when she disappeared: it had been a busy time from the demise of the Technos to the day she disappeared and she had been as busy and as distracted as the rest of them. Jack, Angie, Patch, Dee and Josh had been the only ones who had known her at all well and Jack alone was at the mall when she returned. Jay had thought there was something different in her manner, but had put it down only to the ordeal she had been through. In a way of course, he was right: it was her ordeal that had made her change.

It had taken just one month for the war to break upon the city, like a tidal wave upon a seaside town. Unknown to all but a few Mallrats, Jetta had been an unwilling, but very effective, spy, for all that Cat, Lex, Tai San, Aeryn and Salene had tried to limit the damage. By the time they had cast a strong enough protection spell over the mall, the damage had been done; and what terrible damage that was.

Chrisma and her companions had found out the Mallrats weakness. Although there were only four in Chrisma's army, and only three of those, including herself, witches, the three witches they had were linked together in a powerful and well-pracitsed coven: a triad, bound by blood, sharing their powers freely with each other. The Mallrats had more mages, but only three could form a triad without breaking the laws of nature, and one of those three was untrained: Aeryn.

They had attacked the farm without warning. The milk soured, food went bad and water supplies dried up, all overnight. When Alice went out to her livestock, she found they had disappeared. Every time one of them tried to get out of the farm to the city or to the orchard, some mishap befell them and they would have to return to the farm, empty handed. It took Cat, Lex and Tai San three days to reverse the hex, in which time Andy broke his leg, Tally broke her arm and Denver almost starved to death.

While one side was kept busy with the farm incident, another strike was made in the city. Bread went stale and flies infested the marketplace. Half the city went hungry; the other half died. A famine spread across the city, followed closely by a pestilence that filled the hospital to bursting point. Rage spread like wildfire as rumours flooded the central sector that magic was at work and, when the truth finally had to be told, war was openly declared against the evil coven.

There had been many losses that first year. May and Zed had already disappeared in different directions. Cloe was among the first of them. Weakened physically by her time in the virtual world with Ved, then mentally by his rejection, as she saw it, she became ill quickly and never found the strength to fight. Dee lost her baby, also, and there were far more deaths among the players remaining in hospital than any other group in the city. Even Hawk was brought low by the unnatural disease and barely survived.

When the news broke, however, and the mage wars officially began, was when the Mallrats suffered their greatest losses. There was a riot and the city kids stormed the mall, demanding answers. Both Sasha and Amber fell in that battle, as well as Slade and Josh. Tai San took a heavy blow to the stomach and started bleeding heavily: no-one had even known she was pregnant. Pride was knocked unconsious and lay in a coma for weeks before finally slipping away.

In that battle, however, one painful blow was struck against the enemy as well: Jetta also died. When the riot had occurred, the mall had been half-empty: Jack was at the hotel, Hawk was recovering in the hospital with his family around him, Patch, Dee, Angie, and Cat were working in the hospital, Jay himself had been visiting his daughters and Salene was spending time with a young girl called Sophie, whom she thought she knew. Tai San had been looking after Jetta while Lex was explaining Salene's magical abilities to Pride. Amber and Sasha had taken the chance to have some time alone when Trudy had agreed to take Zac to visit his Uncle Hawk in hospital and, in all probability, Slade and Skye were either arguing or making up!

The attack had come at the quietest part of the day, when only Josh was on guard duty. The young man had been the first to die, falling to be trampled by the feet of the angry mob. Those who were there had put up a brave fight, but it had only been by magic that anyone had survived. Pride had fought mercilessly to give Lex the time to cast the protection spell, receiving his fatal blow in the process, but in the end the spell saved the lives of Lex, Skye and Tai San and forced the crowd to listen to what their City Leader was saying.

After that, the city stopped fighting against the Mallrats and again turned its eyes to them for leadership. Some came forward as mages, offering their powers in aid. They tried to find Chrisma and her coven, but every time they got close, something happened to cause a distraction and the small group vanished out of sight once more. What became obvious, gradually, was that the only times the searchers grew close to finding the enemy was when someone joined them: Chrisma's forces were growing.

For all that the Mallrats had the city in general on their side, their mages were untrained and, by the end of that year, fewer than those of the enemy. A training programme was begun, teaching young and old alike. Even the youngest children in whom magic showed its strength were taught how to hone their skills. It was a long and arduous task but, for a while, things seemed to grow quiet, allowing training to continue in relative peace. There was almost six months of this quietude until the next outbreak of attacks. Then, when the attacks had been overcome, there was quiet once more; thus the cycle continued for five long years, the periods of peacetime growing shorter as the enemy grew stronger, until they eventually merged into one continuous war. It had been almost a year and a half now of unbroken feuding and tomorrow Jay's daughters would join the training programme running in the Mall.


	32. Chapter 32

Chapter 32

Jay stood, nervously outside the door of the training room: the room that had once been used as a nursery five long years ago. As his hand went to the handle, the door opened and a young girl stood there, light reflecting off the silver streaks in her otherwise scarlet hair.

"Sophie," Jay smiled in greeting.

"I know you don't like this," the young girl replied, "but it's better that they are trained and able to defend themselves."

Jay nodded and ushered his two daughters forward into the room. Standing back, he watched as they hurried forward and joined the groups of other children, and some adults, waiting for the class to start. In one corner he spotted Micah standing alone and quietly watching the others with a pensive look on his young face. In another, he saw Brady and Zac fighting silently. It was an odd thing to watch at first, but over the years he had grown used to the two cousins and their ability to communicate telepathically. Salene soon stepped in and tried to separate the two with limited success. Jay smiled as he watched her, then frowned and looked away.

"She would want you to be happy," Sophie said, suddenly, "And you shouldn't feel guilty. The girls never knew their mother, but you will always make sure they know who she was, whether you find someone else or not. Loving another does not mean you loved their mother any less."

Jay grimaced awkwardly then turned away.

"I'd better go and let you get on with things," he muttered, hurrying away.

Salene looked up from the arguing cousins in time to see Jay's back disappearing. She hurried over, but, by the time she reached the doorway, he was gone.

"Go after him," Sophie suggested, looking up at her aunt.

"No," Salene replied, "No, this isn't the time. I have a class to take. Maybe later."

Closing the door and turning away, Salene headed back to her class and began the lesson. There were many new pupils that day, including Hadyn, Trudy and Hawk's son, Micah and Cassie, Patch and Dee's daughter. Salene took them aside into a separate group and put Sophie in charge of them, with Brady to help her. In another corner of the classroom, Mouse was organising a practical lesson of scrying. Salene herself was working with a smaller group of older children with gifts similar to her own. In another part of the mall, Tai San led a class of teenage witches and wizards with the help of Skye and Aeryn, while Lex and Cat organised the adult mages and helped them hone their skills.

The mall was, of necessity, a much more open place to live now, and various changes had thus ensued. Nearly all of the bedrooms on the ground floor had been moved up the stairs. Jack's technological alarms had been almost completely replaced with magical ones and a permanent magical barricade was present around, above and even below the mall, through which only those known to be on the side of the city were able to pass. A similar barrier surrounded each of the classrooms and the fountain: the symbolic heart of the mall and the city. It had taken a long time to cast the protection spells that held the barriers in place and even longer to mark all those allowed through, but it had had to be done.

After leaving the girls with Salene, Jay had headed straight for the den. He poured himself a glass of the apple brandy that had, some years ago now, replaced the old supply of whisky and other spirits.

"Starting early, aren't you?"

Jay spun round to see Hawk standing in the doorway.

"I saw you come down here," the ex-Gaian explained, "You looked like you might need someone to talk to."

"Yeah," Jay muttered, setting the glass down on the bar, "Yeah, I guess it's not been the easiest of mornings."

"The girls' first day?"

"Uh-huh."

"Salene?"

"What? How..."

"Jay, it's obvious, even to those without the powers of nature to help us. It has been for some time."

"Does she..."

"Probably. But she won't say anything until you do."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"E-Ebony..."

"Would have wanted you to move on with your life, as Pride would have wanted Salene to do."

"But I still love her."

"And part of you always will, just like part of Salene will always love Pride, but you can't let that stop you loving someone else. In this time, our lives are too short to risk waiting for one love affair to vanish from our minds completely before another may begin. You should go and talk to her. Tell her how you feel, so that she can do the same. Don't waste time sitting down here getting drunk."

Jay rubbed his eyes and sighed.

"And if she doesn't..."

"She does."

"How can you be..."

"Women talk. I listen."

"Ah."

"Go. Talk to her. Tell her."

"Right," Jay rose to his feet and headed for the door, then paused and turned back, "It's just..."

"What?"

"Everyone woman I've ever loved: Grace, Ebony, Amber... They've all died."

"It was their time. Your love didn't kill them, you just weren't meant to be together that long."

"What if the same is true of Salene and I?"

"Then you are hardly increasing the time you have by standing here."

Jay gave a wry smile and nodded before turning back to the door and heading out and along the corridor. As he reached the main hallway, he found Lex and Cat standing, talking earnestly to Angie. The nurse's bright orange hair bobbed as she talked, doing nothing to dispel the notion that her head was on fire. As they talked, Tai San joined them. Jay caught only a fraction of what they were saying, but was able to make out the word "Siva" as Tai San was being brought up to speed. Raising his eyebrows, Jay continued past the small group and into the classroom where Salene was teaching.

_--_

"I don't think it's such a good idea, Lex," Cat said, warningly, "She's been gone for more than five years. We really don't know that much about her any more."

"She was my wife! What more do you need to know!"

"Your second wife whom you divorced after trying to flee the city with your first wife, if I recall."

"She was still my wife, at one time, and a part of this tribe."

"And then she disappeared. No word to anyone. No warning. Just disappeared."

"She could be useful. Look how powerful Ebony's daughter's are. They didn't get that from their father. Siva is their aunt. She will have that power too."

"She _might_ have _some_ power. There is no guarantee that it will be as strong as the twins. Their mother was always the strongest individual of the three sisters."

"But she could still have some power that could help us. Plus you've known weaker individuals to have greater power than their stronger siblings before, why not now also? Besides, she has a right to see her sister's children."

"She may not even know about them!"

"She does," Angie cut in, "She asked about Ebony and I told her. She was very upset, but she seemed to think it was all for the best."

"Did she say anything?" Tai San asked.

"She said 'two lives instead of one, two I have never known'. She sounded rather odd, but I thought that was just the grief."

"It is an odd thing to say."

"What do you suppose she meant?" Cat asked, looking at Tai San.

"I do not know. She may have meant that Ebony's one life has become two lives. It certainly seems the most logical meaning, but something in the wording worries me. You are certain that this is what she said, Angie?"

"Yes," the nurse replied.

"I still say we should let her through," Lex reiterated.

"Tai San?" Cat looked at her sister-in-law expectantly.

"The future is unclear to me. Much depends upon little. We cannot deny her entry. What she chooses to do after that is her choice and hers alone."

_--_

Jay stood at the edge of the classroom, watching Salene. When she had finished lecturing her group of skilled students, she left them to their tasks and walked over to join him.

"You came back," she said, smiling, before she reached him and felt the worry in his mind, "What's wrong?"

"I... er... I hear that Siva's back," Jay stuttered.

"Here? In the Mall?"

"No, not yet. Cat, Lex and Tai San are just debating whether or not she should be let through the barriers. She's back though."

"That must have been a shock. Does she know about Ebony?"

"I don't know. Maybe. It was Angie who brought the news so she may have told her. She was on duty when it happened, I think."

Salene reached out a hand and placed it on Jay's arm.

"Jay, are you alright?"

Jay looked at the hand on his arm. It was the first time she had touched him in years.

"B-better than I was," he stammered, looking up at Salene's face.

As his eyes searched hers, he felt her hand slide down his arm to rest in his own hand. She smiled, hesitantly. He returned the smile, warmly, closing his fingers around hers.

_--_

Pulling her long coat around her to guard against the cold wind outside, Siva stepped through the barrier and into the mall. Lex and a number of the other surviving Mallrats stood before her in front of the fountain. Tai San was by her husband's side.

"Hi guys," Siva called, uncertainly, "Miss me?"

"Siva, it's so nice to have you home," Trudy cried, gathering the young woman into a warm embrace.

Following Trudy's lead, most of the others did the same. Those who did not know Siva remained at a short distance. When she reached Lex and Tai San, Siva stopped, her smile fading a little.

"I haven't forgiven you, you know," she told Lex, "You could have been straight with me. At least then, I'd have known what I was getting myself into."

"I know," Lex replied, "but I can't change the past, just the future."

"We all have the power to change that," Siva replied, coldly.

"Not always," Tai San cut in, a strange look on her face as she gazed at the other young woman, "Sometimes, only one of us has that particular power."

Siva raised her eyebrows at her one-time rival, then turned away.

"I believe I have two nieces," she said to Trudy.

"Oh, yes, they're just at school just now, over here," the purple haired mother led Siva to the door of the school room and, knocking first, pushed the door open.

From her position on the far side of the door, Siva saw a few groups of children. In one group she saw Salene, a younger red-haired girl, a lilac haired girl who looked enough like Trudy to prove her identity and Jay, looking much as he had five years ago. At Jay's feet sat two young girls who looked complete opposites, but who Trudy informed her were actually her twin nieces. Siva stepped forward to enter the room, but rebounded from the internal barrier.

"Oh, just another little security precaution!" Trudy laughed, "The mall could fall down around their ears, but this and the other classrooms would remain perfectly safe. You had better talk to Lex or Cat if you want to go in to see them now, or you could wait until they've finished school. I do have to talk to Brady now, though, so if you'll excuse me, I'll leave you here."

So saying, Trudy hurried across the classroom to her daughter, stopping to talk to Salene and Jay as well. As Siva watched, one of her nieces looked up. She had the palest skin and hair Siva had ever seen, but the eyes that met her own were Ebony's: piercing and steely grey. They held the same power as her mother's had, Siva noted as the young girl's eyes flicked to the open door and the door then swung shut.

With one hand still resting on the door frame, Siva raised a hand to a pendant around her neck. Her head slumped forward.

_--_

"They have let me in," Siva said, her astral form standing once more before the coven, "It is time."

"You know what you must do," Chrisma replied, "Remove yourself from here, though, or we shall all perish with you."

"No."

"What?" Chrisma cried, enraged, "We agreed what must be done: the war must end! They must die!"

"No. It ends now. Both there... and here."

As she spoke, a light filled Siva's eyes, spreading gradually to the rest of her body. In the mall, her physical body also filled with energy: energy that had been filtered into her through the spells of the coven, leaving them weak. When the energy reached its peak, it burst out, flooding both the mall and hidden warehouse of the coven, bursting out into the city and destroying everything in its path. When the light had died, the mall was no more. Much of the city had gone. All that remained were the three classrooms and the fountain, protected by their bubbles of magic.


	33. Chapter 33

Chapter 33

A hovercraft buzzed lazely from one tall tower to another. In the plaza below stood a relic of ages past: a stone fountain, elaborately carved in the graceful image of a phoenix. This fountain was the only remnant of a world long gone: the mall around it had, centuries ago, been razed to the ground but, even after the fountain had fallen, the citizens had recognised it and restored it to its now honoured condition. Before the fountain stood a tour group, their attention fixed on the two holographic images before them. The computerised guides finished their speech and handed the group over to another hologram that had appeared nearby. As the group disappeared round a corner, the male hologram gazed longingly after them.

"You saw her then," said the female, flicking her long, blonde hair over her shoulder.

"Yeah," the male replied, running his hand through his peroxided hair, "She looked happy, Ellie."

"I noticed," Ellie replied, "I also noticed that this is the third time this week that she's been around here while we've been here."

"I know."

"Has she spoken to you yet?"

"No. Why should she? She doesn't know who I am, not the way I know her."

"It always amazes me how you manage to pick her out, Ved. Every lifetime she's had, she winds up here and you know her, no matter what she looks like. One time she was even a guy!"

Ved laughed, remembering his initial shock when he had recognised Cloe's soul in a young boy about his own, permanent, age.

"Well, Cat did warn us that that might happen!" Ved said, eventually, walking over to the fountain and sitting down.

"It's funny how they all seem to end up back here at some point."

"I think they're tied to it," Ved shrugged, "like they are to each other."

"Maybe," Ellie sat down next to Ved, "It still hurts, you know."

"What does?" Ved asked, only half listening.

"Seeing them together."

"Oh," Ved's eyes widened in comprehension, "That! Well it's only been a few lifetimes since the bond was re-forged - it'll get better in time."

"Will it?"

"Sort of. The number of times Cloe's turned up here with someone else, I should know! She even had kids one time!" Ved smiled, "I always knew she'd make a great mother."

"But you and Cloe were meant for one another," Ellie moaned, "Jack wasn't meant for me, yet it still hurts!"

"Just because you're not his soulmate, doesn't mean the love you had for him wasn't real."

"I guess."

The two sat in companionable silence for a time, watching the ever changing world around them go about its daily life.

"I'm going to have them shut down my programme," Ved said suddenly.

"What?" Ellie cried, "Why?"

"It has been almost four hundred years since the end of the Mage Wars, Ellie. The city has been back on its feet and running smoothly for almost half of that now: it doesn't need me any more. I'm just keeping the memory of how we got here alive now: the dream has become reality. You know all there is to know about the history of this place, just like every other dormouse hologram out there. It's all well documented too. I'm not needed any more. If they delete me, there's a chance I'll go back in the loop: that I can be with Cloe again instead of just watching her from a distance. I might not know everything about her like I do now, but I can find it all out again, from scratch. Do you understand?"

Ellie looked up at him with tired eyes. Of course she understood. How could she not? She had spent almost every day of the past four hundred years by his side, watching him as he scanned every crowd, every life for Cloe's soul, celebrating with him when he found her happy and commiserating with him when he found her sad. She put a hand on his shoulder and silently nodded her head. The next day, he was gone.

_--_

For fifty years and more, Ellie lectures the tour groups on the mall and its unique history. Every day she watched, sometimes seeing old school friends, sometimes seeing family, until one day she saw them. The tour group that day was a college class. Ellie smiled as she saw Alice standing close to a young man she recognised as Ned. Looking through the rest of the group, she recognised the others: Jack and Jetta; Amber and Sasha; Ebony and Jay; Salene and Pride; Aeryn and Mega; Lex and Tai San and all the rest standing side by side before the phoenix once more.

"I wonder what we would have been like if we had lived then," Cloe whispered to the young man beside her.

"What makes you think we weren't?" Ved replied.

Fini


End file.
